\ 



PS 2197 
.K755 

Copy 1 



ABOUT WxU 



A CLIMAXIC. 



/l^l^L/ly 



,") 



' BROOKLYN. N. Y. 

PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR. 

Price 25 Cents. 1882. 



( 



ABOUT HELL! 



A CLIMAXIC. 



-^> .V > < ^!!SN3NaO-.^- • . Y 






BROOKLYlf . N. Y. : 
PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR. 

1882. 



(' 



-y C; 



.\^n 






Entered, according to IJM of Oongress, in the year 1882, 
By M. KKAUSKOPF, f)^ 
In the Office of the Librarian of Coneress, at Washington, D. C. 



AU Bights Reserved hy the Author. 



r. E. CRONK, Printer, 372 Broadway, Brooklyn, E. D. 



PREFACE. 



To the Reader: 

In placing before you the fiction contained in this volume the author begs to say that his 
princrpal ^mrpose in creating it has been to put his art to the highest use by making it serve 
the highest interest of Man. the religious, and in a manner that at once rationally engages the 
reason of the reader by impartial 'y dmplaying weak points and strong points of some of the 
various religious beliefs and noribeliefs^ and healthily attracts the imagination by vividness, 
compactness and swift succession of portraitures of sceiies of human emotions and passions. 
How far he has realized that purpoi<e is not for him to say ; but he ventures the hope that 
though yoit, kind reader, may perhaps find fault with this work, you will, lohatever your belief 
or nonbelief, be more or less benefited by a ilioughtful p)erusal thereof He therefore begs that 
you give it a thonghtftd perusal, and also a kind mention to your friends. 

Very respectfully, 

The Author. 



ABOUT HELL! 



A Olimaxic. 



PERSONAGES. 

Mk. Benjamin Eelebud (a gentleixiau of about 
thirty years of age) ; Mrs. Susan Eelebud (his wife) ; 
Aechie and Lillie (their children : the first, six 
years ohl ; the other, three years old) ; Miss Eele- 
bud (a maiden lady and sister of Mr. Erlebud) ; Me. 
Claeence Jaegger (a gentleman of about *orty years 
of age) ; Me John Hodingeb (an ex-judge, and friend 
of Mr. Erlebudy, a physician ; a servant ; landlord 
of a hotel. 

Time — 1876. Location — A city in one of the West- 
ern States of the United States. Scene — A suite of 
rooms in a large hotel. The first is a parlor, the 
second a library, the third a V)edroom. Their ap 
pointments indicate their occupant to be a man of 
wealtli and culture. 



[On the opening, Mr. Erlebud is walking angrily 
rtl)out the library. The immediate cause of his an- 
ger is a speech which Mr. Hodinger delivers to a 
crowd of hotel-idlers in the rotunda adjoining the 
rooms. Mr. Jaegger is seated at a small table iu the 
parlor, and is absorbed iu the study of a chess- 
probleu).] 

1 

HoDiNGEE. — I say, it's fun to me to hear the par- 
eons shoot smartness at me. I'm in that like an old 
deacon w'lO |)rayed " O Lord ! I've got to thank Thee 
for the V)ad as well as for the good ; and so I thank 
Thee that a In-other has called me hard name.-!. And 
seeing that I can give bim a dozen for his one, I praj' 
that Thou m-ayest permit that brother to call me 
some more hard names 1 " (The croicd is heard 
laughing ) There's old parson Brown. Because I 
dun't believe in liis heaveu, he flings at me the lable 
about a fox and sour grapes. Why, to speak of fox 



is to think of parson. I can recite to you any num- 
ber of points of similarity between the fox-class and 
the parson-class of the beast species. (Laughter by 
the crowd.) A parson would rather miss a chance to 
see a sinner roast in the hell oven than miss a chance 
a't a chicken fresh from the kitchen oven. And we 
all know how fox loves chicken. In fact, to me this 
similarity in taste for chicken between fox and par- 
son is one of the most striking evidences ot the truth 
of the Darwinian theory on the origin of the human 
species. That the parsons don't eat chickens raw, as 
does the fox, is because, having in imagination so 
long contemplated the roasting of souls in a hell- 
fire, their taste has been developed away from the 
raw towards the roast. (Lmmoderate lamjhter and ap- 
plause by the croiod in the rotunda.) And there's par- 
son Metaphos. His antios remind me of a print in a 
shop-window. It shows a negro who had tried to 
make a line-shot, and had been shot oflf his o'-.'n line 
of horizontal gravitation. The recoil of the gun had 
knocked him down ; and as he lays sprawling on the 
ground, he yells with delight, and insists that he has 
knocked down the gun. and all creation with it. So 
parson Metaphos. In his last sermon he yells at my 
atheism : "Ex mhilum nihil est! Out of nothinl' 
nothing can b^^ made ! thercTore. no designer, no 
design 1 therefore, since this universe evidences de- 
sign, there is a designer of the universe! therefore, 
there is God ! " A strong shot, I admit. But, since 
out of nothing nothing can be made, how can the 
parsons' God have made thisuniverseout of nothing, 
as their Bible compels them to believe? There's the 
recoil that knocks parson Metaphos down ! ( Oi'eat 
applause by the crowd in the rotunda.) I admit it rea- 
sonable to believe that there has been a time when 
there has been nothingness where now tremenrlous 
sunsystems indicate a vast design's labor ; I admit 
that the argument of design hits my atheism some- 



AB0U7 HELL. 



what ; I even admit that that corner-stone hanging ; abhor more than any other it is that of the physioian 
in emptiness, which the Godthesis is, would be of [ who rides a red-hot hobby within hearing of a man 
vast benefit to a struggling humanity if it were not | whose limbs he is amputating, and while the opera- 
for the swindling uses to which the parsons have put ting knife is dripping with blood. And more inhu- 
the hypothesis of original cosmic nothingness by j man than such a man is the lawyer who crows his 
inventing for it a personage called "Devil," and a hobby within hearing of one whom he is divorcing 
place called "Hell," and a sort of a bargain between from his wife ! and a wife as is my Susie! Oh, 



said Devil and their God, by cause of which the 
Devil has a right to lasso every soal into Hell, and to 
torture it ; and then they invented a scheme by 
which every soul can be saved from Hell ; and tbea- 
they appointed themselves the only insurance agents 
under that scheme; and that's the way they got them- 
selves into an easy job, a big salary and plenty of 
leisure! (Laughter by the crowd.) And what is 
worse, that's the way they terrorize and tyrannize 
Man, free born Man ! And that's the reason I hate 
parsonism ! (Applause by the crowd. ) As for me, I 



apply common sense to the hvpothesis of nothing- my^hobby . 
ness by saying that where nothing has been, no per- t:'"™"- 
sonage could have been, and lo ! Devil is gone ! and 
Devil gone. Hell is gone ! And Hell gone, parsonism 
is gone ! And parsonism gone, the greatest curse on 
earth is gone— the Bible is gone! (Applause by the 
crowd.) Yes, that Bible! it's their hell distillery, 
their hell evidence ! And they have stuck to that 
Bible so long that habit has mortgaged all the sin- 
cerity in them into a devotion to it ! And that ac 



Susie ! Susie ! 

HoDiNGEB. — Why, Bennie, you know I don't mean 
to hurt your feelings ! 

Eelebud. — Then go about in these rooms like 
in the presence of death ! Speak in whispers ! 
hush your breath ! there's a death here, a living 
death ! a husband puts away his wife ! a wedlock is 
demolished ! a temple, a living temple is in ruins ! 
Oh, Susie ! poor Susie ! , 

HoDiNGEK. — Well ! I didn't know that you had so 
suddenly experienced a change of mind regarding — 



Eklebud. — Your hobby ! Rather say, your Moloch ! 
(^To Jaepger.) Jaegger ! (Jaegger lifts his eyes, and 
instantly drops them again to the chess-board.) I say, 
Jaegger, you are right ! You always are right ! Lib- 
eralism can be a Moloch as much as Rome or Geneva 
have been ! And in Hodinger it w a Moloch ! 

HoDiNGEK. — But what have I said to-day that you 
have not heard me say again and again ? 

Erlebud.— You know well enough that vour zeal- 



counts why some of them can manage to extract such ot's methods have always been oft'ensive to me ! And, 
beautiful sermons out of its texts. But they are in , to cap the climax, you spread them at an hour like 
that, like the juggler who pulls yards on yards of this and a place like this ! I'll now give you a piece 
new and bright ribbons out of an old hat. Are the of my mind. Combat superstition, follies, iauati- 
ribbons in the old hat? No. It is the juggler's art cisms, tyrannies? Yes ! a thousand times, yes ! But 
that deceives the observer's eyes. So the parsons, must yon, in so doing, tickle the ears of the ground 



Out of that old pile of literary rubbish, out of that 
compilation of inane fables, oiit of that old shoddy 
turban, they draw lessons on lessons, poems on 
poems, sermons on sermons, philosophies on phi- 
losophies ! Are they in that mbbish, in that shoddy 
turban, in that bazaar of inane Fable ? Why, no 
They are the parson's own thoughts, their o-^^n po- 
ems, their own intellectual gems which they disown 
themselves of, to lay them at the feet of that idol, 
called " Bible ! " An idol ? Were it but that ! But 



lings to get cheap applause ? Must you spit at the 
sacred relics of the race, because they ai'e covered 
with the cobwebs of the ages? Must you play the 
lawyer's tricks, the politicians tactics, that bespit 
an opponent as if his mother is a she-wolf, his 
father a hyena, and he an intruder in the human 
family ? Out on such liberalism ! It's a lie, a fraud, 
a libel on the new humanity ! 

Hodinger. — Now, Mr. Erlebiid, I rise to demand — 
Erlebud. — (Interrupts him by addressing Jaegger) 



it is worse than that ! It's the scourge which Oassario Jaegger ! {Jaegger looks up for an instant, and turns 
Rome captured from Jerusalem with which to inflict again to his chess-board. ) I say, Jaegger, you are 



this globe ! Rubbish ? Were it but rubbish which 
can be swept away ! It's worse than that ! It's the 
Asiatic Pest, bred in the plague mires of the Orient, 
and brought to the free-aired Occident to poison it ! 
Oh, how I hate that pest, called "Bible !" I hate it 
like a woman hates the destroyer of her chastity ! 
That pest has caused more hatred, more wars, more 
misery, than any other evil there ever has been on 
earth ! Just look at our friend Erlebud ! See the 
discord it has brought into his life ! See the mis- 
erv 

Eklebud. — ( Unable to restrain his anger, calls fu- 
riously to the speaker in the rotunda) Judge ! 

Hodinger.— (Oufoid* to the crowd.) Gentlemen, 



right. By the side of the bigotry of orthodoxy, and, 
especially, that of the Ultramontane, that sort of lib- 
eralism is like vagabondism by the side of the esprit 
de corps of a dynasty ! 

Hodingee. — ^Sternly.) Now, Bennie, that gets me 
down on you ! 

Eklebud. —(iSteYi to Jaegger.) For the Ultramon- 
tane lives, as you say, in a cosmic palace. Yes, 
Jaegger, I now fully perceive your meaning. You 
are right, Jaegger. You are always right. The 
Ultramontane is one of an army that marches to the 
music of a cosmic hymn. He knows himself to be 
in comradeship with millions that are organized, 
drilled, uniformed, bannered, officered ; that have a 



excuse me for the present. Come to-night to Pep- ' great Past, a strong Present, and a Future : yes, a 
per Hall, and hear me. Admission fifty cents. (T/ie Future lined out, planned out, beine filled out! 
crowd is heard applauding, and then dispersing itself.) bSuch is Rome ! But that sort of liberalism ! It's a 
{Hodinger enters the parlor.) ' fguSrilla on a drunk ! And for that to sacrifice ! for 

; that to divorce my wife, orphanize my babes ! Oh, 
' what a fool I am ! {He rushes frantically into the 
n \ bedroom, and closes its door bangingly.) 



Hodinger — What's the matter, Bennie ? 
xj» Erlebud.— .ludge, I tell you frankly that your 
hSrangue nauseated me. Spare me from it in my 
domicile ! I say, spare me from it anywhere and 
everywhere ! I'm getting sick of it ! 

Hodinger. — Great Jehoshaphat ! what is the matter 
with you ? 

Erlebud. —And don't employ my unfortunate af- not seem to hear.) Sir! Mr. Jaegger ! 
fairs to illustrate your hobby ! ' Jaegger. — (Looks up from his chess problem.) 

HoDiJiGEvi. —{Protestingly.) Well, now, Bennie ! 'sir? 

Erlebud. — If there's any species of meanness I Hodinger. —I V)egin to believe that you are a Je- 



{Hodinger is for a few inomsntx in mute surprise. 
He then, in an indignant tone of voice, addresses Jaeg- 
ger. ) 

HoDi:;f>ER. — Sir, explain me that ! (Jaegger docs 



ell, 



ABOUT HELL. 



suit ! {Jaegger makes no reply, but turn* again to hit 
chessboard.) Sir, you have not answered me ! 

Jaegger. — (Annoyed.) What kind of answer do 
you desii-e, sir? 

HoDiNGEE. — I said. "I begin to believe that you 
are a Jesuit ! " I now say, I do fully believe that 
you are a Jesuit! 

Jaeggeb.^ — Well ? 

HoDiNGEB.— This : That sort of a well is not of the 
kind I want my friend to drink of! (^Jaegger m.i,kes 
no reply, but furns again to his chess probkm. Hodin- 
ger continues angrily.) Understand sir, you can't 
come here, ply yourself as a Jesuit in disguise, and, 
when confronted » skedaddle into j'our chess pro- 
blems ! 

Jaegge . — Say. rather, -'escape into a cloister." 
And, sir, you should learn to respect the sacred soli- 
tudes of your fellow-beings ! 

HoDiNGER. — Sacred, indeed ! 

Jaegger. — And not break into them when they are 
closed against the outer worlds as mine in me have 
been during the past hour ! 

HoBrsG^n. — (Satirically.) Ah ! indeed ! permit me 
to make a note of that. I never could get myself 
heretofore to believe the story of Archimedes — that 
of his having been amidst the noises of the siege of 
a city so lost in mental labor as to be utterly "closed" 
against them. But now, having your assurance of a 
like experience. I am ready to swear to it — and on a 
Bibl<^ at that! Ah! you are indignant! Well, my 
thoughts are, I admit, rather hard-fisted. 

Jaegger.— That is to say "vulgar." Be calm 



groaning, gnawing, clawing Hell ! An abortiveuess ? 
Were Nature but that ! It would be an escape to 
be able to believe that Benignancy purposed, but 
failed ! But it is not tLat ! It is tlie highest phase 
of Existence avenging itselt on Existence for the 
wrong of there being Existence at all ! Nature, har- 
boring herself intelligently conscious somewhere in 
infinite space, brooding upon herself, and jealous of 
the exemption of beasts from a knowledge of exis- 
tence being a curse, conceived this avengement ! 
She brought them into a communalty by creating a 
a new beast-species called "Man." and of which each 
individual has more or less of the greeds of all the 
parent species. To that she added in each indi- 
vidual a few faint sparks of herself, of Reason ! and 
this admixture of greed and reason she shapes into a 
thousand and one phantasms— and lo ! what a Hell is 
Man! 

HoDiNGER. — That's, at any rate, a hellish view on 
Man ! 

Erlbbud. — And none can escape the vortexic ac- 
tion of that Witches' Cauldron ! On rising in 
the morning I reason myself into patiently bearing 
existence on a self-promise to avoid contact with the 
bestialness of the race. Bui. cin I keep the hawks, 
the foxes, the woives, the swine, the anacondas, the 
devil fishes -fie ! (He shiners in a paroxysm of dis- 
gust.) 

HonrNGER. — Why ! why ! what ails you? You look 
scared. There's no devil-fish about me.' My ances- 
tors of the fish period were of the great family of 

swordflsh." So I am assured by members of the 



sir. There is no need of your rolling at me hard { Bar. And they ought to know about it. Bars are 



fists with your eyes. In saying "vulgar" I do not 
mean to reproach or disdain you. I simply state a 
fact. You are vulgar ; I, aristocratic. There i.s 
neither merit nor demerit in being either. It i-< 
simply my being of a certain disposition that harmo- 
nizes not with yours. But I am, for that, neither 
better nor worse than you. Besides, can we help 
being as we happen to be? Can we help being at 
all? Since we cannot, let us, at least, not increase 
the jarrings of that abortiveness, called "Nature" — 

HoDiNGER. — (Interrupts.) Ho, ho! (At that mo- 
ment a lady, in traveling costume, enters the library 
through the rotunda door, runs to the bedroom, opens 
its door, looks into it, but seeing no mie in it, she comes 
toward tlie parlor, stops and listens without being per- 
ceived by the men.) And yesterday you praised Na- 
ture, as Perfect Matrix ! Ho, ho ! Is it not the Je- 
suits maxim to be to each person as he or she hap- 
pens to V>e ? 

Jaegger. — And a most wise maxim it is. As to 
this, yesterday Man did not enter into my views on 
Nature ; and she then S' emed Perfect Matrix ! To- 
da}' he forces himsel into them, with his beast- 
ancestry showing itself in him in all the filth of the 
mires of the vast ages! Aud what an aboitiveness 
Nature is to me to day ! Fie on her ! 

HoDiNGER. — Well, I wouldn't get mad about it ! 

Jaegger. -Let us at least learn this of our beast- 
ancestry. The lion keeps to lion, the fox to fox, the 
eagle to '.agle. the hawk to hawk, the swine to swine. 
So, sir, £ro you your way, and leave me to my clois- 
ter. (He turns again to Ms ch^ss problem.) 

HoiHNGER —One moment, sir. The question is 
not as to which one of us is the lion, and which the 
fox, or which the eagle and which the swine, but 
this : Whiit are your purjioses in influencing Mr. 
Erlebud? You can't come here, and — 

Jaegger. - (Interrupfji angrily. ) 
law of the Witches' Cauldron ! 

HoDiNGER. The what? 

Jaegger. -The Witches' Cauldron. Man! What 
is vile, fulsome, repulsive in our beast-ancestry, 
reappears in Man,— a •• witches' cauldron " indeed, 
into which each sjiecies of beasts pours the effluvia 
of its existence tn conglomerate with the others, and 
Jo! w'liat a seething, bubbling, troubling, hi'-suig, 



submarine observatories, and- 

(Mr. Jaegger, self-possessed again, turns calmly but 
suddenly on Ids heels, steps out of the parlor into the 
rotunda, and is heard walking away. Miss Erlebud 
now quickly enters the parlor. On seeing ?ier Mr. Hod- 
inger looks surprised. They meet and shake hands 
heartily.) 



HoDiNGER.— What biings you here so unexpect- 
edly ? 

Miss Ehlebud. — Where is Bennie? 

HoDiNGER. — Is he not in hie bedroom? 

Miss Krlebud. — Is this the gentleman whom Ben- 
nie met in Europe, and been so charmed by? 

HoDiXGER. — The same. 

Miss Erlebud.- Good heavens ! I am terrified at 
what I heard. I couldn't belp listening. Such a 
i man to be about Bennie, and at a time like this ! 
How could you let him ? 

HoDiNGER. — Rather ask how could I ijrevent him? 
Bennie invited him ; he came; and here he is. 

Miss Erlebud.— I won't permit Bennie to be sub- 
ject to such influences. Why, he'd make a pessi- 
mist of him ! 

HoDiNGER. — Don't be alarmed about that. If there's 
a change at all about Bennie- and I think there is — 
it's toward the Ultramontane ! 

Miss Erlebud. — Towards the Ultramontane ! 

HoDiNGER. — If you'd heard Bennie » few minutes 
ago, you'd have reason to think so. And that led me 
to believe that that Mr. Jaegger is a Jesuit in dis- 
guise. 

Miss Erlebud. —A Jesuit ! 

HoDixGER. — Don't be alarmed. He ain't going to 
drown Bennie in holy water for yet awhile, even if 
he be a Jesuit ! Aud i do believe he is. It^s wonder- 
And escape the i ful how deftly he changes about, and agrees to all 
opinions ; and that, too, upon the standpoint ol 
pessimistic atheism which he pretends to hold. 
Talk of a devil-fish changing color ! here's a human 
specimen of tlie breed. Ju.st like a Jesuit in dis- 
guise. At any rate, he has of late saturated Bennie 
with a disgust towards liberalism, and an admiration 
for Rome ! And so — 

Miss Erlkbud. — Be he what he may, 111 not per- 



6 



ABOUT HELL. 



mit him to influence Benuie, I was terrified in lis- 
tening to him. But where is Bennie ? 

HoDiNGEB. — I guess he is in the garden. 

Mlss Eklebud.— Please call him instantly. {Hod- 
inrjer is about to exit. Miss Erlehud calls 1dm htck. ) 
Wait a moment. How is he? 

HoDiNGEK.— As well as can be expected under the 
circumstances. But what agitates j'ou ? 

Miss Eelebud. —The divorce iiroceedings must be 
stopped ! 

HoDiNGEE. — " Stopped," did you say? 

Miss Eelebud.— Must I scream it into your ears ? 

HoDiNGEE. — Why, the Court will render judgment 
in our favor some time during to-day ! 

Miss Eelebud.— It must not, it shall not, and it 
will not be rendered ! 

HoDiNGEE— But what in the name of goodness 

Miss Eelebud. — Goodness, goodness, nothing but 
goodness it is ! 

HoDiNGEE. — I protest against your springing this 
mine at me ! It ain't fair to me ; nor is it good for 
Bennie ! 

Miss Eelebud —Do I ever act unfairly? 

HoDiNGEE. — Not knowingly. Please understand 
that I am in this aftair. first, the lawyer that has con- 
ducted a case entrusted to him, and don't like to be 
put out of it after having brought it to a suc- 
cessful ii^sue. And I am, secondly, the man that 
represents liberalism, and don't like to be defeated 
by the underhanded influences of a blatant bigot 

Miss Eelebud. -{Liter runts.) You do wrong the 
"Rev. Mr. Metanho-f ii this ! 

HoDiNGEE —But all these considerations, at h^art 
thoucrh T have them. I would instantlv dismiss, were 
it not for Bennie's sak<^ best that he be divorced 
from his wife. I am convinced that only in a total 
separation from her can Bennie's future b'^ made 
fruitful to himself and others. Why, you yourself 
were the mo=:t deliberate advocate of a divorce for 
bim ! 

Mlss Eelebud. — Sol was as long as she insisted on 
keeping the Rev. Mr. Metaphos as first in her confi- 
dence. 

HoDiNGEE. — Exactly. What husband can tolerate 
bein<? excluded from holding the first place in his 
wifp's confidence? 

Miss Eelebud.— Tt was for that cause mostly that 
her orthodoxy became so obnoxious to him ! He is 
too f^enuinply liberal, and loves her and the children 
too passionately to permit only her orthodoxy to be 
a '-nuse of separation from her. 

HoDiNGKE. —Exactly. Therefore— 

IMiss 'E.-Ri.-Esv-D.—dnierrupts.^ Well, the Rev. Mr. 
Metaphos called on me Irtte yesterday evening — 
HODINGER. — Ah ! 

Miss Eelebud.— He was in great distress. After 
depictincr how utterly prostrated in soul poor Susie 
is, he begged me to call on her. I did so this mc rn- 
in<?. 

HoDiNGEE.— I do profoundly pity her as a victim- 
Miss Eelebud. —C/«!!^mf;5fe.') Now. do listen The 
Rev. Mr. Metaphos declared to her in mv presence 
that she is fully able, without the aid of her pastor, 
to hold her household asrainst the aggressions of 
atheism : and he thereon announced, and insisted on. 
his withdrawal as her spiritual adviser. I sav "he 
insisted." because she is unwilling to be free of it ; 
and only his counsel as her adviser could get her to 
accent his withdrawal. She then begged me to use 
my kind offices to reunite her to her husband. Only 
one condition she insists on. As her pastor with- 
draws himself from her household, Bennie's infidel 
friends shall likewise withdraw themselves. I con- 
sider that condition reasonable ; and T am resolved 
to reunite them. 

HoDiNGEB. — I'll call him ; and not a word of mine 
shall mention vour purpose, or strengthen him 
against it. I'm sure he'll not be moved by it, how- 
ever much he'll cry out in the pain of being divorced 



from her. He realizes too well that onl\ in a di- 
vorce can hf- save his future for himself. It may 
for awhile even paralyze him ; but he'll soon recover 
by Inboring hard in either the fields of literature or 
of politics or of social progress. He will have the 
boy to lavish his love upon. Soon he'll find a wo- 
man of qualities fit to be his wife ; and she— well, 
she'll have the girl to dote upon, and will likely 
njarry some missionary. 

Miss Eelebud. -I know him a.nd her too well for 
that. Call h\vz now instantly ; bui first introduce 
Mv. Jaegger to me. I'd like to take a close look at 
the man who so charmed Bennie. 

{Mr. Hodimier exits through parloi' door, and soon 
returns icith Mr. Jaeqcjer. He introduces him to Miss 
Erlebud, and exits. ) 



Miss Eelebud. — My brother, in his letters to me 
from Europe, mentioned tou ho enthusiastically 
that, hearing you impeach Nature — 

Jaegger. ■ {Inter rupis). Ah ! you overheard me! 

Miss Eelebud.— It wasn't curiosity in me that 
stooped to listen, but anxiety to know his environ- 
ments; and what I overheard is nnwholesomeness 
itself. 

J A.EGGEn. ~{Frote.stingly.) Miss Erlebud ! 

Mlss Eelebud. He i^ just now in tliat condition 
when only natu-^e's brightest should be held to him 
that his faith in human nature be not shaken. 

J.\EGGEE. — I, uiKlcrmine his faith in human na- 
ture I 

Miss Eelebud. - Pardon a sister's anxiety ! 

Jaeggee. -Miss Erlebud, there is no need of my 
pardoning what I admire ; and so permit me to 
qualify the views which you heard. Is there in my 
plaint ought which fticts of existence do not evi- 
dence? If Shiikespeare's " Witches'. Cauldron " U 
not an allegory on mankind, and the "witches" not 
on the evil force« of nature, pray, what are thev ? 
Ah ! you do not deny that ! yet would you consider 
"Macbeth" an unwholesomeuess ? 

Miss Erlebud. — I would, at present, keejD it from 
my brother ! I would, at present, have only the 
soft, sweet, divinely siiiiiile voices from the Bible 
speak to him ! 

Jaegger. - So would I ; and the plaint which you 
overheard was not for Mr. Erlebud ; it was directed 
against an intrusion by Mr. Hodinger. Wk do not 
give to intruders the smile of welcome when we de- 
sire their absence. 

Miss Eelebud— Ah ! yon quareled ? 

Jaeggee. —I never quarrel. Permit me to state. 
Mr. Erlebud, smarting under the pain of divorcing 
himself from his wife, a woman whon he not only 
loves, but whom he cannot, from what I hear of her, 
help honoring, hurled, so I conjecture, at Mr. Hod- 
inger an avalanche of reproaches for making to a 
pack of hotel-idlers a vulgar exhibition of the illib- 
eralism of his liberalism . 

Miss Eelebud -Mr Hodinger is, in that, a zealot, 
a fanatic. But aside of that he is as tender heaited 
as man can be ! 

Jaegger. — He is not, at any rate, a seer of the 
sprinsrs of human actions. Were he such, he would 
realize the cause of Mr. Erlebud's just disgust at 
such a liberalism. Think of the elder Brutus at the 
moment when he sacrificed his son to his ideal cause. 
Would not his noble nature hive raged divinely 
mad if his ideal Rome would have shown itself to 
him as very vulgar Rome? 

Miss Eelebud. — Yes, yes. 

Jaeggee. —Thus, Mr. Erlebud. In divorcing his 
wife, he is, in the main, sacrificing to his ideal cause. 
And can he else than rage in disgust when that 
cause, instead of showing itself in the gathered ma- 
jesty of the ages, acts itself vulgarly, viciously ? 



ABOUT HELL. 



Miss Eblbbud. — Yes ; yes. 

Jaeggek. — Mr. Hodinger, not being a seer of the 
springs of human actions, could not perceive the 
cause of Mr. Erlebud's disgust at his vulgar illiberal- 
ism, but ascribed it to me, and charged me with 
b.eing a Jesuit. 

Miss Eelebud. — Ah ! and are you? 

Jaegger. — And you, too ! 

Miss Eblebud. — I certainly accept your denial as 
sufficient. But — and pardon me for saying it, — 
making due allowance for the desire to shield your- 
self against intruders, your outburst had too much 
the ring of a real pessimism. Or was it not an ex- 
pression of your real convictions ? 

Jaegger. — It was. 

Miss Erlebud. — Ah ! I cannot understand how my 
brother could so enthasiata himself for a man that 
holds such a pessimism ; nor how, being so enthu- 
siated, he has so far escaped its pernicious aggres- 
siveness. 

Jaegger. — Mr. Erlebud appreciates my pessimism 
as being nonaggressive — as, in fact, a very sound 
optimism ! 

Miss Erlebud. — Indeed ! 

Jaegger. — Indeed. Please note that the Ortho- 
dox, both of Rome and Geneva, join with me in 
pessimist views on Existence. Their cry is, "This 
world is a vale of tears ! It is an abyss of woe ! It 
is the cradle of misery ! It is the abode of death ! 
It IS a panoply of despair ! It is a panorama of sin !" 
— precisely what, in effect, my remarks to Mr. Hod- 
inger imply. What horrifies you so very much in 
mine is the form of expression ; and the form, I 
admit, is like a grimace of an already hideous face ; 
or like a Sioux face made still more hideous by lines 
of war-paint. But what would you ? We do not, as 
I said, throw roses at intruders. We sacrifice our 
good nature to necessity. We disfigure ourselves. 
We put on the war-paint of the Sioux, and yell at 
the nuisance. But are we, for that, Sioux? Or have 
we no right to sing during one hour hosannas to 
Nature on noting some grand a^t of humanity be- 
cause an hour before we arraigned her on reading of 
some human bestislty ? 

Miss Erlebud. — We certainly have the blessing of 
that right. But I am interested to know how your 
pessimism is a sound optimism ? 

Jaegger. — Both I and the Orthodox are grounded 
in pe.ssimism ; but that of the Orthodox resolves 
itself into a phantasm called '-Devil," while mine is 
Reason's categoric of there being no need at all 
for existence ! Assume, please, tnat there were no 
Existence at all ! What then, if "then" is thenthink- 
ble ? Nihil, Nothingness ! And, "Ad niJiilum niliil 
necesse est! " To nothingness nothing is necessary. 

Miss Erlebud. — (Shiverti.) Oh! 

Jaegger. — But then there is Existence ! The Uni- 
verse cannot be reasoned away ! I may extinguish 
my individual consciousness of existence ; but would 
I not, m the very act of suicide, know that the uni- 
verse will still remain ? I therefore decline to 
make my exit voluntarily ; but I resolve to make the 
most of existence for myself. And I begin by voting 
evil, sin, out of existence ! My motto becomes : 
All that happens to be is, as it happens to be, as good 
as it crm be ! This is my pessimism become optim- 
ism. This is siy creed. It is Reason's. To it there 
is no " sin." That called by yon " sin" is good, ay, 
most excellent, if rightly used. To it there is neither 
" good " nor " bad " in any thing in se. That called 
by you "good" or "bad ' in Mr.n is, in my creed, 
simply either to have the art of utilizing environ- 
ments and accidents in one's existence for the pur- 
pose of self-contentment, or not to have it. Every 
person is religious in the degree of his possessing 
that art. Mine, in brief, is the religion of art. I il- 
lustrate : Is mineral poison good or bad ? It is 
neither. The good or the bad is in the art of the 
person that uses it. He or she may misuse it. Or 



suppose a person by insisting on being veracious 
about an occurrence, causes comfiicts and annihila- 
tions, which could be avoided by the substitution of 
an imagined fact for the actual occurrence. Which, 
pray, is the "»in" — the veracity or the lie? Ah! 
you are shocked ! but, please consider : That called 
"lie" is an act of the imagination. It is the ideal 
asserting itself over the real, the free over the con- 
fined. It is that, no more, no less. Here, for in- 
stance, is a picture, in surface twelve square inches 
of matter. I now look at it through a magnifying 
glass, and lo ! it expands a thousand times, and my 
pleasure with it ! Is not that expansion — a lie ? 

Miss Erlebud. — Sophistry, thy name is — {She 
stops. ) 

Jaegger. — The art of truth-telling. 

Miss Erlebud. — {Indujnantly.) Sophistry, the art 
of truth-telling ! 

Jaegger. — Precisely ; and the highest phase of 
art. It is the art of the highest human freedom, the 
art that enables its possessor to reasoningly adjust 
himself or herself to his or her environments for the 
self-contentment of the Now of his or her conditions. 
I illustrate : To-day the necessities of my conditions 
require, in order to calm my disturbed self, certain 
views on this or that, and which views are the very 
opposite of those held by me on the same this or that 
a year ago, a month ago, ay, an hour ago ! If I suc- 
ceed in reasoningly acquiring the required view, I 
achieve a triumph in the highest phase of art. My 
reason fits my imagination consistently to the re- 
quirements of the Now of my conditions. I attain 
self-contentment, hai^piness. I make the most of the 
accidents of my conditions and of those of my envir- 
onments. This is my optimism, my creed. And 
tbis my creed cannot possibly be aggressive. I do 
not even ofi'er it to any one. I merely state it to 
those that are intellectually able to appreciate it. I 
even hold that a view opposed to mine is superior to 
mine lor those to whose intellectuality it is better 
adapted, — if it makes them not aggressive. But 
there's the point with the orthodox. Their creed 
is a phantasm. To them " good " or " bad" are in 
universal entities in an incessant struggle against 
each other. Of those one is good because it cannot 
be bad ; the other is bad because it cannot be good. 
The good— saints, angels, Christ, God ! The bad- 
sinners, fiends, demons. Devil ! Devil in conflict 
with God ! All those evils of Existence are the Dev- 
il's doings ! "But have faith!" the orthodox cry 
out. "God will win!" God! What is God? 
Who is God ? Where is God ? By what means will 
Hs save ? By what means does He communicate 
those means? And lo ! a hundred and one phan- 
tasms arise in answer, each claiming to be the only 
true, the only saving ! See, now, the result ! See 
the religious feuds and wars ! See the dissensions, 
the tyrannies, the inquisitions, the Jesuitism, the 
revolutions, the hell ! 

Miss Erlebud. — Sir, I am very much interested. 
01 course, a simple mind like mine is not expected 
to have the privilege of being one of the elect that 
can, ad libitun/., make to-day right what was yester- 
day wrong, and wrong to-daj' what was yesterday 
right ! 

Jaegger. — It is indeed a most select privilege 
which I would be happy to see you accept. 

Miss Erlebud. — But this I venture to say : In lis- 
tening to you, I seem to hear the voice of priests 
of the courts of the Pharaohs performing, for its 
exclusive benefit, this miracle of the metamorphosis 
of i^essimism into such an optimism— while caste 
held the peoj^le in bondage and stagnation ! What 
a blessing this hell — since hell you are pleased to 
call the conflict of creeds ! In that hell the Genius 
of Mankind battles incessantly for higher trcths, and 
lifts incessantly the millions into higher spheres ! 

Jaegger. — Beautifully said. iJut permit me to 
remark that I am yet to be told that when ancient 



ABOUT HELL. 



caste divided the race into r-lasses, even tiae lowest 
bad not more contentment, plenty, happiness, than 
the poor laborers of our times ; or that it is easier to 
be content in culture than in ignorance ! Etjyptian 
caste ! that reminds me of the accident that gave 
us the stuttering Hebrew ! aud I fear me that 
we will never recover Irom it ! Oh, those reformers 
whose mania is teaviug down, upsetting the equilib- 
rium of society, inventing new faiths to set tlie race 
in fire, — the fanatics that heap evil on evil, mise- 
ries on miseries, wars on wars, revolutions on rev 'lu- 
tions ! If I could but stay them ! But I cannot. 
So, true to my creed, I make the most of the accident 
of my position in society. I charm myself by ob- 
serving the panorama of the battle's motion. I 
observe it. Sitting high in the tower of my thoughts, 
— a god, unimpassioned, and not partaking of the 
smarts and woes of the drama I witness. Here and 
there, when convenient, I step for a few moments 
into it, and soothe where soothe I can. Or when I 
find myself, as here, in a troublous whirl, I escape 
into my cloister — that chess-board there ! There also 
I am a god — an unimpassioned mover in a drama 
whose dramatis i^ersonas are dififerentiated spheres of 
motion. There I quaff Battle, ay, Spirit of Exist- 
ence, -without soiling myself M-ith the sweats of the 
human battle. Rest easy. Miss Erlebud, Mr. Erlebud 
is in no danger because of my pessimism. 

Miss Eelebud. —I assure you, I am fully at rest. 
I now understand how he can pass in your society 
charmed, and yet unscathed. He has heart ! He is 
too panting for action in behalf of his suffiring 

fellows ! He is too true to conscience, to Christ, to 

(At that moment Mr. Erlebud enters. She ntojjs on 
seeing him enter.") 

Miss EEiiEBUD. — (T/rrow-s" Iter arms around him.) 
Bennie ! 

Eklebtjd. — {Kisses her.) Aggie! dear sister ! 

Miss Eelebud.— (.ffmes him.) My dear, dear bro- 
ther ! 

Eelbbud. — You are just the person I want to see ! 
{He takes her hand, and draws her after 7dm.) Come ! 
come ! {They enter the bedroom. He dose.'f the door.) 

6 

Jaeggee. — (Alone.) Fie! Such a beastish phan- 
. tasm to move itself in me ! I forswear me henceforth 
all self insurance against the contagion of phantasm- 
ery ! And my facial will — where was it when that 
dog barked it at me? His, a sword-lish : mine, a 
devil-f— ! fie ! (He shivers in disrjust.) 'Tis so for- 
eign to me that even my tongue refuses it service. 
I will get me away from the contagion of this hot-bed 
of phantasmery. (He rings the bell. A servant enters.) 
Send instantly for my valet. He is at the florist's. 
{Servant boios and exits.) And that thus I leave be 
punishment that here I came. What would I here ? 
That I in Europe operated on that windisb loon was 
well enough ; but that here I came, to note the effects 
thereof, is greed. What is it to me whether he is 
this or that ? I'll get me hence from this hotbed of 
greed. Yes, greed ; nothing but greed ! And I dare 
say he thinks himself a Brutus ! The fool ! As if 
his "New Humanity" is not a greed-phantasm, a 
jealousy of the spiritual powers that be, a craving to 
destroy ! The fool ! And there's another, an old 
maid! I dare say she "loves" some one who did 
not respond ; and so she would rather pass bereft of 
woman's rights of maternity, than marry another ! 
And she thinks herself a sweet sufferer ! The pre- 
tence ! As if such very renunciation is not a greed- 
ish craving for that some one ! Greed, greed ; noth- 
ing but greed ! And she listened to me— the voice of 
unimpassioned, greedless reason, condescendingly 
opening to her the highest vistas —like one observing 
a juggler's art ! And she looked wise and sang : 
" God ! conscience ! heart !" The ignorant ingrate ! 
As if the God of the populace— Ae/- God — is not a 



vast, wordincarnated reflex of human greed, that, in 
being attributed with the motorship of the univei'se 
shows the absorbative greed of the reflected ! And 
as if conscience is not self-cowardice — a self-fear- 
ingness in consequence of weak degrees of reason, 
and, therefore, of incapacity to realize fittingness 
in every accident, or to make it fittingness. Aud 
as if Heart is else than conscious greed, subtly 
abiiorbative, either as passiou, or as fancy, or as 
sentiment — phantasms all, showing' and acting 
themselves in a thousand and one ways ! And as if 
Heart is not the cause of all the miseries of human 
hfe, and Eeason not of what little fittingness it 
attains ! '3^0 fools ! I will get me hence. What 
would I here ? Be watched as a devil-f — ! tie ! that 
! again ! No ; no. She dic\ noi look it at me ; nor, I 
now think, did that person. It was but a random 
' t rust. 'Tis my own thought, I now remember, in- 
cepted in Loudou when observing an octopus change 
I color ; that was the embryo of this phantasm, now 
j made strong by this cniitagion. I will weed it out of 
I xne. I will get me into freer airs. Remain here to 
be watched as a Jesuit? The barking fool ! Had he, 
at least, said "Jesuit-gineral ! " That wer.- a prize 
for me ! To make the globe a chess-board ; to Re- 
cruit among mankind's masses for the wealthiest and 
brightest : to assign to each a sphere as pawn, or as 
knight, or as bishop, or as rook, or as queen, or as 
king ; to force, by superior reason's might, resisting 
wills into allotted grooves : to cement all with a 
sacerdotal hocus-pocus ; ay, to labor for the destina- 
torship of the globe I Ah ! but there's the point ! to be 
a pawn for years before I can be even a bishop I that 
is not for Clarence Jaegger. No ; no. I will keep 
the even tenor of my way. I will get me back to my 
inmost circle. Or —pooh ! tis not worth the while. 
I will not experiment in this bedlam. Rather, for 

play, move those dumb 

{The library door opens, and Miss Erlebud is seen to 
rush out into the rotunda. Erlebud enters jubila,ntly.) 



Eelebud. — I've done it, Jaegger ! I've ilone it ! 

'Jaeggee. — Done what? 

Eelebud. — Can't you see it on my face? Now, 
leave that chess-board ! do, look at me ! 

Jaeggee. — You do look like a man awakened from 
a nightmare ! 

Eelebud. —Just what I feel. I and my wife reconcile! 

J.iEGGEE. — Ah ! 

Eelebud. — What else than that? I shiver on re- 
flecting how nigh I came to a catastrophe ! Unwife 
my wife ! unhusband myself ! rob my birdies of 
their truest nest ! Slaughter, — yes, it would be 
slaughtering human hearts to an idol ! Ain't that 
so, Jaegger? 

Jaeggee. -Certainly. Anything that shackles the 
will, or imposes a painful sacrifice, is an idol. 

Eelebud, — Just so. I say, let the liberal world 
shake its mane as much as it likes ! Let it, for all I 
now care, dip itself into the very prismal Fact, if so 
it can ! And though it arise in a very halo of Heaven, 
it shan't draw me from mine ! My home, my heaven ! 
I want that. I want my birdies in my lap. I want 
my Susie nestling on my bosom. I want peace, 
!ove, hearth, heart. Can you blame me for wanting 
that ? Can you, Jaegger ? 

Jaeggee. — A most wise resolve, indeed! 

Eelebud. — Of course, you can't. Who can ? Or 
should ? You have never seen her, Jaegger. A 
woman, gentle as a lamb, soft as a hind, simple as 
truth, yet keenly watchful like an eagle, brave like a 
lion, and firm as a rock in defence ot what she holds 
to be her charge. And should j'ou see her, as oftn 
on her Sabbath days I have seen her, with her soul- 
gates opened wide, and avenues of lustrous peace 
draw you into serenity--should you see her thus — I 
say, Jaegger, I was downriglit mad to sacrifice such 



ABOUT HELL. 



a heaven for such a liberalism ! Ain't I right, 
Jaegger ? 

JAEGGBri. — A most coiTect view indeed ! 
Erlebud. -I'll be the liberal indeed. Let her do 
as she wants to. Let her be ou her knees every hour- 
stroke of the clock. Let her pray, adore, worship. 
Rather, a thousand times rather, that than see her 
be like those women that ogle a would-be-worship at 
the accident of protoplasm ! Ain't I right, Jaegger? 
Jaegger. — A very good view, indeed ! 
Erlebud. — Nor do I yield one iota of my cherished 
principles. Let her teach her young as she likes. 
My birdies have my pedigree. I trust them as I 
trust myself. They will, when grown, spread their 
wmgs, and rise out of the sacred cobwebs like ea- 
glets from their nests ! They'll need but glimpse the 
avenues of this century to break for them, panting in 
the race of progress ! So, why bother now about that? 
Let her have her way with them. Ain't I right, 
Jaegger ? 
Jaegger. — A most correct view, indeed ! 
Erlebud. — And what has been in the past a stum- 
bling block to our peace is removed. Her pastor 
counseled her to withdraw herself from his spiritual 
advisorfehip, and to place me first in her confidence. 
To be excluded from the spiritual confidence S^ 
of one's wife — you can't know, Jaegger, how that 
burns, how that stings ! It's Hell, I tell you ! But 
I can't blame the jJastor for that. It's she herself 
that insisted on giving him that first place as the 
representative of (rod to her. And, from his stand- 
point, he had to side with her in holding her 
household for the Lord, as he calls it. I can't 
blamo him. And I honor him for defending her 
in her loneliness. Yes, I'll honor him publicly 
for it ; especially since he withdraws himself. Ain't 
I fight, Jaegger? Well ? What have you to say? 
Now, Jaegger, do, I beg you, leave that chess-board ! 
To the deuce -with, it ! I beg you, warm up ! Don't 
be so frisid ! Don't lift your eyebrows like that ! I 
do declare, Jaegger, when you are in tliat mood you 
seem to me like an octopus when his blood runs 
brown! {Jaeg(jer starts aniirily.) Well? What's the 
matter ? 

Jaegger. — {Calmly.) Nothing; nothing. What 
should be the matter ? 

Erlebud. — Now, do fill the gap between now 
and the time she'll be here. She'll be here soon. 
Now, tell me candidly your views on this affair. 

Jaegger. — My dear Erlebud 

Erlebud. — To the point! don't, for heaven's sake, 
make your long introductories. 

Jaegger. — I beg you to excuse me frem saying 
ought in this affair ; because, firstly, I never mingle, 
even by uttering opinion, in conjugal difficulty ; sec- 
ondly, because I respect rights of property. 
Erlebud. -Whats that? 

Jaegger. — You have been, as now you are, in this 
aii'air "in the hands of your friends,' — a phrase 
peculiar to this country ; and one that implies that 
they have rights of property in you. 

Erlebud. — I guess, not much. I'd like to see the 
men that claim to own me ! Friends though they 
be, I'd whittle them out of possession quick enough ! 
Jaegger. -Why should you, my dear Erlebud? It 
i^ a most delicious luxury to be so owned. It is a 
badge of distinction, a belt of championship of some 
cause or other, a mark of chieftaincy. The unwritten 
law under which that species of rights of property is 
vested — 
Erlebud. —{Interrupts.) Not that now! 
S fiE.GG'ER^— {Continues.) Could have arisen only in 
this country where leadership is not hereditary. 
Men here are ever on the lookout for a superior man 
to lead them, to make of him a standard, a rallying 
point, a cry of war, a chief! And when they have 
found him, or think they have found him, how they 
cling to him, fight for him, build him up, raise him 
up, and, as in yo'ur case, assume all the rights he 



has in himself with that delicious audacity, with 

thbt charming 

Erlebud. — {Interrupts.) No one owns me! I'll 
smash them ! 

Jaegger.— You would in that do wrong. Of all 
the phases of the law of natural selection that one is 
the most delicious. I delight myself in observing 
it ; for it calls forth the most delicious traits of hu-' 
man nature. That romantic attachment ; that sweet 
anxiety for his welfare, for his name, for his fame ; 
that trust ; that faith ; that self-abnegation ; that 
idolizing. 

'Ets.-l^ebv-d. —{Interrupts.) I say, to the deuce with 
that now ! What is it you are driving at ? 

Jaegger.— Though your friend, I have not yet 
the honor of belonging to that circle of ladies and 
gentlemen that are " youv friends." And I, for one, 
prefer to delight myself with respecting their rights 
in you ; especially since in so doing I protect my- 
self agaiiist being observed with suspicion by thfem. 
Erlebud. — Who dares, who has suspected you? 
And of what? {Jaegger makes no reply.) Now, I 
want to know ! 
Jaegger. — Do I owe an answer? 
Erlebud. —Do you not ? 

Jaegger. — Let me reflect a moment. {Pause of a 
few moments.) Being your friend, you have a right 
to ask it of me. But I decline to give it. You desire 
to know the special cause for my declining, as the 
general reason I assigned, is, I admit, hardly suffi- 
cient to excuse me for it. Now, if I decline to state 
the special cause, you are likely to have your faith in 
human nature shattered. 

Erlebud. — "Likely!" Assuredly so ! ' 
Jaegger. — I will state the speciarcause, and read- 
ily so, because it shows Mr. Hodinger in a most 
favorable light as a friend of yours. Nothing les? 
thau the most solicitous care for your welfare could 
have induced Mr. Hodinger to suspect me as, and 
charge me with, being a Jesuit. 

Erlebud,— He did? I'll stop that. If disinterest- 
edness assumes despotic powers over me, I'll vote it 
a divine nuisance, and torpedo it. I'll write a note 
to the Hon. John Hodinger, a writ of ejection, which 
he, lawyer as he is, will appreciate. {Seats himself at 
a table and writes.) 

Jaegger. — Don't ! my dear Erlebud ! don't do 
that ! 'Now 4— {He stops on seeing Hodinger enter in a 
state of indignation.) 



Hodinger. — Bennie ! 

Erlebud.— Ah ! you are here! Good. I was just 
indiljing to you some gentle lines. Well ? What 
makes you so indignant ? 

Hodinger. —Your sister brought me a verbal order 
from you to instantly discontinue divorce proceed- 
ings ! 

Erlebud. — And do you doubt my sister's word? 

Hodinger.— No. But you are to-day irresponsike ! 

Erlebud.— Indeed ! 

Hodinger.— A man vi'ho at the moment victory 
perches 

Erlebud.— Victory, indeed ! Hell's victory ! Un- 
derstand that you don't o^^-n me ; nor does any one 
else ! 

Hodinger. —Who says that any one does own you? 

Erlebud. - Ho, ho ! the lawyer must swing a scalp 
though all the heavens fall ! 

HoDiNGEii. -Benjamin Erlebud, it's true, I am. a 
lawyer, but not a divorce lawyer. I hold, as well 
you know, marriage to be such a §acred controict that 
no fee 

'Eri.ebvd. -{Interrupts.) Fee! oh, yes, the fee! 
here it is ! {throics hills at Mm.) If that ain't enough, 
I've got more ! 

Hodinger.— (Tlws tU hilU.) There! Uncle Sam 
is hard up; and this will help him a little. {Lights a 



10 



ABOUT HELL. 



match, and burns the bills.) I'll now go to the court- 
house. Your wife's counsel is busj' on some case or 
other. As soon as he'll be through I'll fix things 
with him. Good by, Mr. Erlebud. Remember that 
I ain't a divorce-lawyer ; so don't you come to me 
again ! {He walks toicards the door. ) 

Erlebud. — Well, you needn't go away angry ! 

HoDiNGER. — (Stops.)— I ain't angry. Or do you de- 
sire me to remain and witness your shaking hands 
with the Rev. Mr. Metaphos ? I guess I won't. Be- 
lieve me, none of your friends will ask me to report 
to them about it ! 

Eblebud. — {ImpMiently.) Well! well! 

HoDiNGEB. — Bennie ! 

Eelebud. — Well ? 

HoDiNGEK. — I haven't now a word to say against 
your reconciling yourself to your wife. If you can't 
endure being divorced from her, it is best that you 
be reunited to her. But do this, at least. Walk to 
the corner of the street. There you'll find, sitting in 
a carriage, your wife, your children, and that parson 
waiting for your sister's signal to come to you. Take 
your wife and children out of the carriage, and tell 
the driver to drive on to— to — wheresoever he wants 
to ! Take them yourself ! don't have them delivered 
to you here ! Save your friejids that shame ! It's 

your duty, Mr. Erlebud! Good by, Mr. Er 

I say, Bennie, old boy, good by ! {Exits.) 



Eelebud. — Stoj) ! hold on ! {He hurries after him, 
but returns instantly.) He is gone. What a con- 
temptible thing — this throwing of a fire-brand, and 
then running away ! I'll quench that ! It's a lie, a 
Satanic lie ! I trample it down ! I spit on it ! Up, 
Jaegger ! Up ! help me ! Jaegger ! 

Jaegger. — {Looks up.) What is the matter again ? 

Eelebud.— Haven't you heard himV 

Jaeggee. —Really, Erlebud, you annoy me. 

Eelebud. —And you haven't heard him ? 

JAEG^p•EE. — I have not. What was it about? Does 
he threaten to dynamite the globe ? Do not be uneasy 
on that account. We are not yet in sight of thai. 
Nor is Mr. H odinger the man for that. 

Eelebud. — 'Twould be monstrous ! 

Jaeggbe. — What would you? Mj^ dear Erlebud, 
facts are facts ! 

Eelebud. —Facts ? Facts ? 

Jaeggeb. —Certainly. It is true, it shows itself in 
mankiad as yet very faintly, but enough to show 
that there is a tendency towards it ! 

Eelebud. — Whai facts ! What tendency ! 

Jaeggee. — Am I not talking about suicide ? 

Eelebud.— Fie ! don't bother me ! 

Jaeggee.— Really, Erlebud, what is the matter 
with you ? 

Eelebud.— Must I tell you in words ? 

Jaeggee. — Let me reflect. There's a change in 
you. You seem to be suppressing a rising rage. 
Mr. Hodinger has been here. Some words he spoke 
caused it. What were they ? 

Eelebud.— He told me to go down the street to 
where my wife and children are waiting in a car- 
riage, and to take them myself —to take them— that's 
what he said, and not have them delivered to me 
by — by— can't you understand ? 

Jaeggee. — I do understand. Mr. Hodinger can 
reconcile himself to your reconciling yourself to 
your wife ; but he cannot reconcile himself to your 
reconciling yourself to the Rev. Mr. Metaphos. 

Eelebud. — Is that all? Is that all? 

Jaeggee. — What else can there be ? 

Eelebud. —You should have heard the tone of his 
voice in saying it ! There was a world of meaning 
in it — a world of meaning ! Well ! Why don't you 
answer me? 

Jaeggee. — My dear Erlebud ! 

Eelebud. — For once, I beg you, come to the point 
at once ! 



Jaeggee. — I now understand you. But, my dear 
Mr. Erlebud, I am sure that your construction of 
Mr. Hodinger's words is but a reflex of your own 
suspicions ; and I dare say, unjust susi^icions. 

Eelebud. — You "dare" say! You only "dare" 
say ! 

Jaegger. —Don't, please, spring at me. Remem- 
ber, I am not acquainted with either of the parties. 
Your wife I have never seen. Mr. Metaphos has 
been pointed out to me ; but I do not form an opin- 
ion about any person on sight. So, upon the repre- 
sentations you made to me about your wife, I dare 
say that your suspicions are unfounded. 

Eelebud. — There is, then, a possibility — 

Jaeggee. — A possibilitj'^ ! My dear Erlebud, you 
are in a bad vein. I cannqt understand how you can 
be during these moments : Let me reason with you 1 

Eelebud. — Yes ; reason — calm, analyzing reason ! 

Jaeggee. — I hold that no person can claim for him- 
self, or herself, an impossibility of ever being seduced 
from loyalty to any of the many kinds of duty and 
honor. There is, on the contrary, a possibility in 
even the best of persons to be seduced should influ- 
ences, especially fitted to act overwhelmingly on his 
or her weak jjomts, so called, but, really, greed 
motors strongly developed, happen to act at them. 
The most a person can claim is having accidentally 
escaped an overwhelming attack on their weak 
points. Suppose, now, a person stands charged 
before a court. Is he or she not held as innocent 
until the crime, if any has been committed, is evi- 
denced? Is the tact of possibility of crime in every 
person of any weight in determining that one to be 
guilty of the crime charged? 

Eelebud. — That's true ! that's good ! 

Jaeggee. — Possibility ? Certainly. Learn to look 
at it i-almly. Possibility? Certainlj'. It you ask 
me " What is Man ? " I answer : a conglomeration of 
the many phases of greed. In one person one or 
more phs.ses predominate, in another others predom- 
inate. Are therefore, all men and women adul- 
turers ? 

Eelebud. — Adulturers ! 

Jaeggee. -Are all men and women without that 
self-respect, without that self-honoringness that 
guards the secrecies of life from pollution ? 

Eelebud. — That's true ! that's gocd ! thanks to 
conscience ! 

Jaeggee. — Be reasonable ! do not judge upon the 
fact of the possibility of such guilt between them. 
Their companionship, intimate as I suppose it has 
been, may be yet free of that sort. Be reasonable ! 
do not drown your common sense in a shallow pond 
of Othello-foam ! I say, be reasonable ! Since you 
have no proof against them, you may as well be- 
lieve 

'EuijEbvd. —{Interrupts.) Believe! Oh, if this — 

{At that moment the parloi' door opens, and Mrs. 
Erlebud, carrying a child, enters.) 

Mrs. Eelebud. —Bennie ! 

Eelebud. — {Takes her Jumd, and drags her toward 
the window.) To the light, Susie ! let me look into 
your eyes ! {He takes her passionately into his arms.) 
My wife ! my jewel of a wife ! my honor of a wife ! 
my own, for ever ! 

Mes. Eelebud.— Oh, Bennie ! {Miss Erlebud, lead- 
ing a boy, enters. The Rev. Mr. Metaphos follows.) 

Metaphos. — Peace, in the name ot Christ ! 
( Climax. ) 

SECOND PART. 
1 

{Mr. and Mrs. Erlebud, in raptures of reconciliation, 
are seen to enter the bedroom, having the children with 
them. Miss Erlebud is in the parlor, and in a tearful 
ecstasy. Jaegger had stepped aside. 

Metaphos. — {In an ecstasy of delight.) Now, sister 
Erlebud, I call you a child of God ; for you are a 



ABOUT HELL. 



11 



peacemaker ; and "Blessed are the peacemakers ; 
for they shall be called the children of God ! " 'Tis 
they that pave for man the paths to the eternal gates 
of hefiven ! Their feet step white like the feet of the 
messengers of Zion, the Blessed, when, bringing the 
tidings of salvation, they ran, swifter than hinds, 
on her holy hills ! Their heads shine golden with 
the crown of the highest priesthood ! From their 
eyes shines endlessly a procession of saints, martyrs, 
angels and archangels ! Their lips are the Supreme 
Bench of all the worlds ; they charge in justice ; they 
plead in wisdom ; and in mercy render they jtidg- 
ment. And such, siKter, are you, a peacemaker, a 
deliverer, a savior, a child of God ! Think of it ! An 
hour ago that woman was weighed down with a great 
grief. Of the most wifely of women, she found her- 
self pilloried in t'ae charge of unwifeliness. Of the 
most loving of wives, she saw the executioner's ax in 
the hands of him she loves next her Savior and her 
God, — ay, an executioner's ax to behead her of the 
glory he brought to her on her nuptial day, the 
glory o' wifehood ! And you saved her. And you 
saved those dear children. And you saved me. And 
you saved your brother, an honest man, an upright 
man ; you saved him from the clutches of Satan ! I 
saw !iim~that lawyer - ha, ha ! how discomfited that 
blasphemer looked, that Goliath of Gath, that de- 
famer of the Lord God of Israel ! 

Miss Erlebod. — Don't, dear Mr. Metaphos ! I beg 
you. don't cloud our peace. 

Metaphos. — I won't. I won't mention him at all 
to-dav ; and I know he won't show himself here to- 
day. He feels like the Satan that tempted our Lord, 
and got kicked for his trouble ! 

Miss Erlebud. — {Protestingly.) Now, brother Met- 
aphos ! 

Metaphos. — That's the last of him to-day. And 
please introduce me to this gentleman. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — (Calls from tlie bedroom.) Aggie, 
dear! {Miss Erlebud introduces the gentlemen to each 
other, and exits into the bedroom. ) 



Metaphos. — Glad to make your acquaintance, sir. 
I always like to becOije acquainted with a stranger 
when his countenance interests me. And yours 
does. 

Jaegger. — Sir, you are very kind. For me, I am 
ever i^leased to make an acquaintance through Miss 
Erlebud. 

Metaphos. — She is indeed a noble woman. Though 
not. denominationally speaking, of my kin, I say it 
rejoicingly, she is a Christian woman, one that 
smiles in sorrow, and weeps in joy. 

Jaegger. — She is indeed a jewel, made lucent by 
the strokes of Pate. She is like a fountain in a 
desert. It murmurs so sadly of a grief in the heart of 
the earth ; yet it scatters its currents that oases may 
grow, to rest the weary and to shelter the lost. 

Metaphos. — Well said, sir ; well said. That has a 
different ring from the rigmarole of that gogmagog of 
that lawyer. I suppose you are of Mr. Erlebud's 
mind on religious questions? 

Jaegger. — Sir, I have no fixed opinious about 
them. 

Metaphos. — You should, sir; you should. We 
can serve only eittier the Lord or Satan. Under 
which king, Bsmzonian? 

Jaegger. — Under myself, sir. 

Metaphos. — That means, I suppose, a neutral. 
Well, sir, you can't be a neutral. Those gigantic 
issues ! God or no God ! Christ or no Christ ! Soul 
or no soul ! Hell or no hell ! Who can fail to take 
sides? What man can hide when the tug of war is 
heard ? You don't look like such a man ! And so I 
suppose that you are undecided. Well, I'll help 
you. sir. I'll take you out of the woods. I'll talk to 



you. But not to-day. I'm too full of this afifair. 
Thank the Lord, the dove is in her ark again ! When 
the dove is a woman, and the ark is her husband, 
she leaves it only when she is driven from it. And 
he need not, like father Noah, look in vain for her 
return. Lo ! 'tis she that is waiting for a signal to 
return ! And the signal came. Blessed be the Lord ! 
Sir, I shouldn't wonder that Mr. Erlebud's change of 
heart is due somewhat to your influence. In that 
case 

Jaegger. — Not in the slightest. I deliberately ab- 
stained frem influencing him one way or the other. 

Metaphos. — But you can't, my dear sir. No man 
can abstain from acting on his fellow men. Light is 
dumb, yet acts on man ! a statue speaks not, yet 
acts on man ! a book hears not, yet acts on man ! a 
flower knows not, yet acts on man ! a beast under- 
stands not, yet acts on man ! And can man fail to 
act on man ? Your eye speaks ; your hand speaks ; 
your foot speaks ; your hair speaks ; your posture 
speaks ; ay, your silence speaks ! 

Jaegger. — I retract mv assertion. My sympathies 
having been with Mrs. Erlebud, it is, perhaps, likely 
that my silence was eloquent in her behalf. 

Metaphos. — Exactly. And there he comes with a 
blessing on his face ! {Jaegger steps aside.) 



Erlebud.— (^/iters the parlor and sfiakes hands with 
Metaphos.) Mr. Metaplios, I confess that I have 
been to a large degree the cause of the disagn-ement, 
the ending of which we are so happy to have reached. 
I recognize the disinterestedness of your devotion to 
my wife. I thank you ; I heartily thank you for de- 
fending her, while a defence she needed, against me. 
Metaphos. — That's nobly spoken. I thank you for 
yourself, for myself, for all good men and women. 
Believe, I have longed for this moment as ardently 
as the hart panteth for the water's brook. It is the 
greatest joy of my life to reunite you. For the Lord 
is my witness that I did not enter your household to 
sow discord, or to alienate aff"ection, or to arrogate 
unto myself rule, or to cause grief in any shape. I 
hastened to the call of "help!" I saw your wife 
holding her household as a fort against the foes of 

the Lord 

'E.B.z.KBVB. —{Interrupts. ) As to that 

Metaphos. — {Interrupts.) I saw her, a woman, 
battling alone manfully. And could I, a soldier of 

the Cross 

Erlebud. — {Interrupts. ) As to that 

Metaphos. —{Interrupts. ) Could I turn aside when 
her eyes looked beseechingly for help ? 
'Erl.-ebvd.— {Interrupts.) As to that- — - 
Metaphos. ~-(/>ite?7-wpA«.) No, sir. I could not 
then. Now I can. You bravely recognize your error. 
That's enough tor me to withdraw myself. Your 
wife can now hold her household unaided by me. I 
look for the day w^ien your hallelujah will ring 
through the camp of the wicked like Gabriel's horn! 

Erlebud. — {Interrupts.) As to that 

M.-ETA.vuos.—{I)iterrHpts.) As to that, believe, 

brother, it's the Lord's doings! This triumph 

'ERj.EBVD.—ilnten-upis.) This triumph is one of 
love, of humanity! It is a triumph of heart! Shall I 
mar it by stickling for trifles ? No. I rather will 
show a justice by finding a joy in your sincerity. 
But this I must say in justice to'myself: There will 
be no further need for any forts in my household. I 
propose to rule it on the basis of absolute religious 
liberty. My wife's rights of conscience shall be res- 
pected in every way. And as I will not make the 
slightest effort to change her convictions, I can't see 
how there can be any further trouble in my house- 
hold. 

Metaphos. — That's all we want. Such a Christian 
spirit in your household can't help becoming a foun- 
tain that will soon deluge 



12 



ABOUT HELL. 



Eblebud. — {Interrupts.) The late unpleasantness. 
Now, dear sir 

Metaphos. — {Interrupts.) Now, brother, permit me 
to see our legal counsel, so as to stop instantly all 
l^roceedings in court regarding this late affair. 

Erlebud. — My counsel attends to that. 

Metaphos. — I'd better see to it myself. 

Eblebud. — As you please. [^He shakes hands once 
more with Mr. Metaphos. The latter is about to exit. ) 

Mes. Erlebud.— (CaZfe from the bedroom.) Mr. 
Metaphos! 

Metaphos. — Well ? 

Mrs. Erlebud.— Don't go, please. 

Metaphos. — I'll be back in a few minutes. (Exits.) 

EnijEBVo.— (Addresses Jaegger.) Clarence! 

Mrs. Eblebud. — {Galls from the bedroom) Bennie, 
love! 

Erlebud. — Well, Susie? 

Mrs. Erlebud (from bedroom.) The child ain't 
well. 

Erlebud (to Jaegger.) I'll be back in a moment, 
Clarence. Remain here. I'll present you to my 
wife. (He enters the bedroom, takes the child and ca- 
resses it. ) 



Jaegger (ctfene. ) Pooh! I have seen dogs look as 
adoring, as enraptured! And he calls this "a tri- 
umph of heart!" Out on that brazen greed! It claws 
existence to tattei's, and when reason frames, in spite 
of it, a harmony, ho! it squats upon it and flaunts it- 
self, "Behold my triumph! It's I, Heart! Don't 
you know me?" A.s if this lull in that tempest is 
else than Reason holding Heart for a few moments in 
chancery! As if, like the sobered dmnkard, craving 
for the distilled fiend even while under the spell of 
a Gough or a Murphy, the heart of each of those is 
not at this very moment on the tiptoe tor its pet 
phantasm, and ready to renew the clawing, tae hell! 
How enraptured he looks! And a moment ago he 
swallowed most cravenly the disgustive medicine of 
facts! The tattling fool! He begins to nauseate me. 
In one moment he vaunts of her troth, speaks of her 
eyes as avenues of pure lustre, and in the next he 
sinks her into the mire of his vulgar jealousy. And 
he has the impertinence to disclose to me what he so 
carefully hides from even that lawyer. Let him but 
approach me again with it! And that, too; he, too, 
had to throw Octopus at me. Fie! What is there 
about me that every fool barks it at me? Pooh! I 
will uoi notice it 'Tis beneath me to notice it. 'Tis 
a lie; 'tis the spitting of their jealousy at my supe- 
riority over them. Such an ance-,try. mine? 'Tis a 
lie, a vulgar lie! And that I at all notice it is a 
symptom of there being the embryo of a fever in me, 
and the contagion of this hotbed of phantasms 
gave to it the ingredient to form itself into such one. 
I will weed it out of me. It dis'^usts me with my- 
self. Fie! 

Erlebud.-- (Calls from tJie bedroom.) Clarence! 

Jaegger.— (J.s^■(?e.) "Clarenc:;!" Asiflamoneof 
such like! But let me for a moment glance into 
those avenues of lustre, if only to get me back to my- 
self! 

(He enters the library. Mr. and Mrs. Erlebud eo.ter 
it. He is seen to introduce Jaegger to Mrs. Erlebud. 
The latter two are seen to converse. A servant is seen to 
enter and address Jaegger. llie latter bows to Mrs. 
Erld)ud and exits, follmced by the servant. Mr. and 
Mrs. Erlebud enter the parlor.) 



Eblebud. — Last night, Susie— (He stops.) 
Mrs. Erlebud. — Well, love? 
Erlebud. — I passed your residence. 
Mrs. Erlebud. — I know it. I called you and you 
ran away. 



Erlebud. —And was it you that called? 

Mrs. Eblebud. — Why, love, who else could it have 
been? 

Erlebud. — I thought that my imagination deceived 
me. But how cr.me you to know ? 

Mrs Erlebud. —I was ou my knees praying to the 
Lord that He keep that awful doom from you. For 
myself, though all the courts of the land would shout 
to me. "You are divorced from Benjamin Erlebud!" 
I would in my soul have said, "No! I have been 
married to him by a minister of Christ, and I am his 
wife for ever and for ever!" No power on earth, no 
Satan around us, can make me perjure myself before 
the Lord, mv God! Though you should have spurned 
me 

Erlebud. —I was in a < dream, Susie— in a horrid 
dream! I wasn't myself, Susie! Susie, I haven't 
been in real earnest about it! It was only a passing 
breath of spite! It never was a real determination 
founded in an absolute sense of justice! Brought 
face to face with divorce from j'ou, I did shrink from 
it as if a grave had opened before me. 

Mrs. Erlebud.— Oh, Bennie! 

Eblebud. —Oh, Susie! Take me back, Susie! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Why, Bennie, I would live as your 
wife, as your ever and ever true wife, though di- 
vorced from me you would be and married to an- 
other. 

Erlebud.— I ever marry another! Perish the 
thought! 

Mrs. Erlebud.— Now the Lord gives you back lo 
me, shall I not take you? I bless Him now in joy 
as I blessed Him in sorrow! The Lord be praisea! 

Erlebud. — Susie! 

Mrs, Erlebud. — Well, Bennie? 

Erlebud. —Let us make a bargain. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — A bargain between husband and 
wife? Should they be traders? 

Erlebud. — A compromise, then. 

Mrs. Erlebud. —Are we belligerents, that need to 
compromise? 

Erlebud. — Call it by any name you please; but, 
Susie— 

Mrs. Erlebud. — But what, dear? 

Erlebud. — I give my faith, or rather my soul, into 
your charge. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — The Lord be praised! 

Erlebud. — But you, in turn, must give your con- 
science into my charge. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — How can I? 

Erlebud. — Do you believe that I have clear con- 
ceptions as to what is right, humane, just, good, 
correct conduct ? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — As a Christian woman, I do de- 
clare that you do have them. 

Erlebud. — Theu let me and me only, be hence- 
forth your spiritual adviser. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — How can I ? Why, Bennie, you 
are not a minister of the Gospel! 

Erlebud. — Is not salvation free to all ? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Certainly. So is law; but can you 
practice law without studying it, going through ex- 
amination, being admitted to the bar, pleading ac- 
cording to statutes, precedents and authorities ? 
Like unto that is salvation, but in the divine degree. 
All is law. "Nature," says Mr. Metaphos, "is law." 
God's mercy to sinners comes to them in the chariot 
of law. Salvation is by law. And under that law 
His ministers are appointed. Why, Bennie, even if 
you were a minister, you could not be my confessor. 
Yon would be too tender to nic. You would over- 
look faults, even sins. Not so, Mr. Metaphos. The 
dear, good man! Not the smnllest blot of sin that 
hides in the soul escapes him. Now, Bennie, dear, 
don't contradict me. You were just going to. Don't 
you want to know what told me that you passed my 
residence last night ? The Lord told me. I was on 
my knees praying for you. Suddenly, in the still- 
ness of the night, I heard steps. Said a voice in my 



ABOUT HELL. 



13 



soul, " That's he!" You stopped a moment; then you 
slowl}', slowly went on; then yoii stopped again; 
then on as;ain; then I cried through the window, 
"Bennie!'' And at that you ran away. 

Eelebdd. — I thought it was fancy in me that called 
to me. 

Mbs. EiOiEBUD. — It was God that brought you here 
in answer to my prayers! Now don't be rebellious 

against the Lord! For our children's sake {The 

child begins to cry. She interrupts herself.) The child 
is sick! {She runs into the bedroom, takes the child froyn 
Miss Erlebud's arms, and endeavors to calm it. She 
soon has it asleep. She remains there, and is seen to 
whisper to Mi^s Erlebud. ) 



Erlebud. — {Alone.) I wms^ bear it. 1 will hear ii, 
and patiently. I can't, like so many others, have 
happiness without paying for it dearly. That's evi- 
dent Well, so be it. Let go the latest lights I so 
fondly cherished. Let them go. Let her burn the 
old wax-candles. I'll admit them. Why not? I 
can stand them. I can stand unything biit that! 
To none but me shall she disclose her innermost 
soul, make confession of her moral and spiritual 
doubts and struggles. Not that I suspect — ! suspect ? 
Oh! Is the old hell still to flicker in me ? What can 
I do? What can I do to smother that parasite in me? 
This won't do! This won't do at all! Oh, poor, 
helpless humanity! Ay, helpless, wretchedly help- 
less! Mensure stars; analyze suns; bridge oceans; 
make pathways through the air; make a lightbeam a 
message-carrier between globes; make dumb nature 
a parrot to transmit the audible sounds of her unfold- 
ing soul to the end of time; ay, make the firmaments 
\inroll themselves, and show forth their records of 
worlds since their genesis, as, circling through them, 
they imprinted and do imprint themselves on them; 
do all those, and more, more than all these — yet still 
a poor humanity, a wretchedly helpless humanity! 
A fear, a mistrust, a suspicion can gnaw it all, undo 
it all, — make all these spheres of glory a mockery, a 
tantalizing hell! ! What can I do to keep this out of 
me ? What— oh! This won't do! this won't do at all! 
I must do something! I'll gorge myself with the 
mannas of the universe! Poetry, art, philosophy, 
and, greatest of all, religion— all these upholding 
woman as the casket of earth's purity, — I'll have all 
these around, above, beneath, within me ! And if 
still I'll suspect, I'll say it's a phantasm, a foul in- 
truder, a seroent in my Eden, bred in the swamps of 
hell, an owl, nesting in the twigs of sin ; ay, of sin 
in me, in me, not in her. No! no! not in her — not in 
her! 

Mks. Eklebud. — {Calls from the bedroom.) Bennie! 

Eelebud. — Well, Susie? 

{He enters the library and meets Mrs. Erlebud and 
Miss Erlebud, carrying the child. ) 

Mbs. Eklebud. — The child is sick! 

Eelebud. —Let me take her. 

{He takes the child, but she isfr'etfnl.} 

Mbs. Eelebud. — The poor darling! Don't you 
know pa. darling? {Tlu- cJiild refuses to beheld by 
Mr. Erlebud.) She is really sick! {She takes the child 
again.) 

Eklebud. — I'll go for a physician. 

Mks. Eklebud. — No, no, Bennie. Mr. Metaphos 
practiced formerly homceopathy. He treated the child 
a year ago, and understands her ailing. 

Eklebud. — But it's best to have a practicing phy- 
sician. I'd rather call one, Susie, dear! 

Mks. Eklebud. — No, no, Bennie. There's a bless- 
ing in the medicine Mr. Metaphos gives, and 

( Metaphos enters. ) 

Metaphos. — I couldn't get to speak to our lawyer. 
He is pleading in some case or other. But I left a 



note for him. and it's all right. What's the matter 
with the child ? 

Mrs. Eklebud. — The poor darling has again an at- 
tack of fever. 

Metaphos. — Let me take her. 

{He takes the child, and she instantly becomes quiet. 
He carries her to the bedroom, followed by Mrs. Erlebud. 
He is seen to question her regarding the child. Mr. 
Erlebud seats himself angrily at the table. Miss Erle- 
bud observes him anxiously. ) 



Miss Eelebud. — Bennie! 

Eklebud.— Well ? 

Miss Eklebud. — Are you perfectly well ? 

Eklebud. — Why do you question me? Do you 
wish to increase the clien telle of Dr. Metaphos ? 

Miss Eklebud. — What have you against Mr. Meta- 
phos? 

Eklebud. — Nothing. Why, what 

Miss Erlebud. — Bonnie, dear, I fear me you ain't 
quite well! 

Eelebud. — Now, dear sister, don't foist any doctor 
upon me! 

Miss Eklebud. — The ailing I suspect 

Ei^lebud. — Suspect! What do you suspect in me ? 

Miss E LEBUD. — Are you perfectly well? 

Eelebud. — I don't know what you do mean. 

Miss Eelebud. — -Now, let me look into your eyes! 
You won't? Bennie, it needs that only the best in- 
fluences meet you until you will have fully out- 
grown 

Eelebud. — What in the name of goodness do you 
mean? 

Miss Eelebud. — Is Mr. Jaegger to remain here? 

Eklebud. — Why do you ask? 

Miss Eklebud. — I don't like that man. His bril- 
liancy seems to me like the gorgeous glow of a tropi- 
cal vegetation behind which the boa lairs, ready to 
pounce at some creature or other. Has he not in- 
flamed your mind as to {She stops.) 

Eklebud. — Inflamed as to what? 

Miss Eelebud. — Why so passionate? Great hea- 
vens! 

Eelebud. — Now, what did you mean? Now, you 
miist tell me! 

Mjss Eklebud. — As to— as to your faith in human 
nature? I overheard him to-day, and I heard^ 

Eklebud. — What ? 

Miss Eklebud. — Poison! And now and then his 
eyes flashed poison! 

Erlebud.— Pooh! don't be foolish! His pessimism 
is the most harmless thing in the world. It's his 
plaything with which he disports himself; and when 
in the heat of play, he, like an actor, flashes with his 
eyes the spirit of his role; but in reality he takes no 
interest in anything. It is very difficult to enlist his 
activeness. At anj' rate, I'm not aware of having be- 
come in the slightest degree inflamed by him. On 
the contrary, he takes an impartial and just view on 
men and things. And, of course, men and things 
are not what they should be! 

Miss Eklebud. — Will he remain long? 

Eklebud. — I invited him to spend some months of 
his time with me. But I dare say that, should he 
meet susincions— and he is very keen to detect them 
{He stops onhearing Mrs. Erlebud call him.) 

Mes. Eelebud. — {Galls.) Bennie, love! 

Eklebud.— Well? 

Mes. Eelebud. What troubles you? 

Erlebud. — Nothing; nothing. 

Mes. Eelebud. — Come in, love. The child, Mr. 
Metaphos says, is really ill, and a regular physician 
must be called. 

Eelebud.- -I'll go for one instantly. {Exits.) 

Mes. Erlebud.— (Ca?&.) Aggie! 

Mlss Eklebud. —Well, Susie, dear ? 



14 



ABOUT HELL. 



Mas. Eelebud. — Where is Archie ? 

Miss Eblebud. — The sweet darling is playing in 
the garden. 

Mrs. Eelebud. — Please, Aggie, hold the child for 
a few momenta. 

{Miss Erlebud takes the child and remains in the bed- 
room. Mr. Metaphos and Mrs. Erlebud enter the 
parlor. ) 

8 

Metaphos. — Take my counsel, sister Erlebud. 
Consult your husband's wishes in all temporalties. 
I must reprove you for not instantly doing so in this 
matter. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I humbly stand reproved. 

Metaphos. — Says the Apostle, "Wife, obej' thy 
husband," meaning, of course, in all things tem- 
poral, and when the husband's wishes are founded 
in justice and reasonableness. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I humbly stand reproved. 

Metaphos. — In this matter 5'^our husband is right. 
I am only an amateur physician; and if he prefers a 
regular practitioner for his sick child, I can only 
agree with him. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I 'humbly stand reproved. But 
you have so often and so beneficially treated the 
child, that I believed you may wish to treat her again 
for this illness. 

Metaphos. — Now, sister Erlebud, don't weep. 
Don't agitate yourself needlessly. I understand you. 
You believe me chagrined in not having the privi- 
lege of prescribing for the child. What nonsense! 
To pacify you, I'll give her a powder. It will soothe 
her until the physician will arrive. (Re takes a pack- 
age out of his coat-pocket, takes a powder from it, and 
hands it to Mrs. Erlebud. ) May the Lord bless the 
drug! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Amen! 

Metaphos. -Dissolve it, please. Or let me dissolve 
it. Or, no. You yourself dissolve it, please. I do 
believe there is in a mother's hands a blessed poten- 
cy that imparts itself to the medicine she gives her 
babe! Now, don't weep, sister! 

Mrs. Erlebud. --I'd rather you would dissolve it, 
and give it to her. I do believe there is in the hands 
of a minister of the Gospel a blessed potency that 
imparts itself even to a drug! Do, please, dis- 
solve it. 

Metaphos. — I thank you. I do it with pleasure. 
(He takes the powder and dissolves it in a glass of water. ) 
Be this mixture blessed! Ma-" Raphael, the angel of 
healing, waft health through this medicine into every 
atom of the child's body! 

Mrs. Erlebud . — Amen! {She calls to Miss Erlebud. ) 
Aggie, dear! 

(Miss Erlebud, carrying th£ child, enters the parlor. 
Th^ medicine is given to the child. Miss Erlebud again 
retires to the bedroom, and is seen to caress the child.) 

Metaphos. — Yes, sister, you have a great task be- 
fore Tou. On you alone rests henceforth the duty of 
holding your household for the Lord and His Christ. 
And I say this to you: Although you return a victor, 
let not your husband be made to feel that he is the 
conquered. Rather act as if he is the victor; but act 
firmly. Watch all that surround him. Let no scof- 
fers enter. Let no secret subtlety, opposed to our 
Lord and His Christ, master him thi-ough friend or 
acquaintance. Be considerate to his notions. Don't 
try to cut them oS at once. If they are harmless, 
don't cut them oflf at all. Don't argue doctrinal mat- 
ters with him ; but show him the faith in you , the 
Christ in you, as you sp well know. So don't weep, 
sister. You have a great task before you; but in 
laboring at it 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Ever! ever! 

Metaphos. — In laboring at it you will gain strength! 
You will run from victory to victory! You will shine 
in the glory of a Christiaik womanhood! Your hus- 



band will rise and call yon "Blessed!" Your chil- 
dren will bow and call you "Blessings!" Yes, the 
wicked will be abashed! The camps of Satan will 
keep dumb! Christ will rule your household! Christ, 
the Helper! Christ, the Purifier! Christ, the Speak- 
er of Truth! Christ, the Strength! Christ, the Just- 
ice! Christ, the Mercy! Christ, the Love! Christ, 
the Savior! Christ, the God! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Amen! Amen! 

Metaphos. — So take comfort, sister! take comfort. 
Don't weep, sister! be cheerful! be strong! 

Mrs. Eelebud. — Brother Metaphos, my thanks 

Metaphos. — Don't sister. Thank me by not thank- 
ing me. I am a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ. 
And in manner as a servant of a king reflects on his 
master's bounty when accepting recompense from 
any one but him, so would I reflect on mine were I 
to permit you to thank me. My recompense is in the 
privilege of being a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Amen! Amen! And do you, bro- 
ther, really mean to leave me henceforth without 
your guidance ? 

Metaphos. — Believe me, sister, it's best. It's no 
more necessary. You have reached that spiritual 
strength that makes my advisorship no more neces- 
sary. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Brother Metaphos, I am uow re- 
turned to the vineyard the Lord allotted to me to 
labor for His Christ, and to guard it against His foes. 
But who is to guard me, to watch me, if you no more 
turn your eyes at me as often as heretofore ? 

Metaphos. — Why, there's no more need of watch- 
ing you! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Brother Metaphos, as a free Chris- 
tian woman, I rise to reprimand you! You are tempt- 
ing me! 

Metaphos. — Sister Erlebud! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — It's true, the Lord tempted Abra- 
ham; but that is the Lord's privilege. The Lord 
knew Abraham's strength of faith, and that no harm 
would arise of the temptation. But can you, a mor- 
tal, know that your tempting me may not cause me 
to sin? We pray, as you teach, to God that He lead 
us not into temptation; because it is His privilege to 
so lead us, if it pleases Him. Are we not His ? Are 
we anything of ourselves? We therefore pray that 
He withhold Himself from acting His privilege But 
that for which we pray to Him, we have a right to 
demand from our fellow-mortals. Brother Metaphos, 
as a free Christian woman, I reprimand you. 

Metaphos. — But, sister, wherein have I tempted 
you? 

Mrs. Erlebud.— You are tempting my vanity in 
making me believe that I need no more watching, 
that I am above sinning. Am I not born in sin ? Am 
I not, like all mortals, naturally depraved ? Is Satan 
not ever acting in me and on me ? Must we not ever 
watch each other, since it is the strength of sin to 
blind self-judgment? To whom, if not to you, am I 
now to lay bare my soul ? To whom my confessions 
of doubts, of unbeliefs that ever attack me ? 

Metaphos. — Place your faith against them! Your 
faith, sister, your faith! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — These are the lesser dangers, and 
my faith can hold against them. But to whom can I, 
if not to you. lay bare the spots of sin that fasten 
themselves to my soul — the angers, the jealousies, the 
ill-wills, the vanities, all the many weapons of Satan ? 
Metaphos. — Sister, think of this: A housewife is 
required to keep her dwelling free of dust. Now, 
wouldn't she be foolish if she were to go about con- 
stantly with a microscope to her eye, and a brush in 
hand, trying to see a speck of dust on the furniture, 
and anxious to remove it ? Now, don't weep, sister! 
I didn't mean to hurt your feelings! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I weep because you are wearied 
on your post, and I likely the cause. Brother Meta- 
phos, you are relaxing in your vigilance against 
Satan. 



ABOUT HELL. 



15 



Metaphos. — Why ? 

Mes. Eblebud. — A speck of dust can't injure furni- 
ture: but a Bin, though but a speck, is an infliction 
on the soul! It brings with it, as yon well know, a 
loss of grace! 

Metaphos. — That's so, sister! that's so! I stand re- 
primanded by you. This is awful! This constant 
watching is wearying. Lord have mercy on me! 
Sister, I do envy your strength. It's you that should 
watch me ! It's you 

{Erlebud enters. Metaphos stops. ) 



Erlebtjd. — Is the child better? 

Mbs. EELEBtTD. — She is quiet in Aggie's arms. Ag- 
gie, dear! {Mm ErUbud comes into the. parlor.) Will 
the physician soon be here? 

Eklkbctd. — He wasn't at home, but I left my ad- 
dress with a request that he come instantly. 

{He seats Idmself at a table, and is seen to write has- 
tily a note. The efdld calls fondly to Mr. Metaphos. 
He takes her and carries her to the bedroom, followed by 
Mrs. Erlebud. He caresses the child, and places her on 
the bed. Mrs. Erlebud is seen lost in thought.) 

Miss Eblebitd. — Come, Beunie. 

Erlebud. — Do spare me from your over-busy anxi- 
ety. I have a note to write. So don't disturb me. 

{Miss Erlebud enters the bedroom and converses for a 
few moments xmth. Mrs. ErUbud and Mr. Metapluts. 
All then come back to the parlor. ) 

Mes. Eblebot). — Love, can't you postpone writing 
yonr note ? 

Eelebdd. — Why? 

Mrs. Eblebud. — Had you not better see personally 
to the withdrawing of — of 

Eblebud. — ^Oh, that's all right! that's all right! 

Metaphos. — I think I and Miss Erlebud can see 
to it. 

Miss Eblebud. — Let us go, Mr. Metaphos. 

{As they are about to exit 

Mbs. Eblebud. — {^Addresses Miss Erlebud.) Aggie, 
dear, please bring Archie in. He is asleep on the 
grass, and may catch cold. 

Miss Eblebud. — Yes, dear. 

{Mr. Metaphos and Miss Erlebud exit. Pause of a 
few moments. Mr. Erlebud continues writing. Mr. 
Metaphos re-enters, carrying the sleeping boy. He places 
him on the airpet in the library, and exits. ) 

Mrs. Eblebud. — Bennie, dear, I'll take the child to 
the bedroom. Please close the bedroom door after 
me. There's such a draft in these rooms! 

{She enters the bedroom. He follows her, closes first 
the bedroom door, and then entering the parlor, he close* 
the library door. 

10 

Eblebud {alone.) Such an intimacy! I can't, on 
seeing it, keep this hell out of me. Calmly; let me 
think calmly. Tbere's the hard logic of facts to base 
Jaegger's view. There m a possibility. Monstrous 
though suoli a hypocrisy be, itis possible even amidst 
such a sternness in professions of the God-belief! 
The God-belief! .Taegger is right. The God-belief is 
a blanc profession in niuety-five persons or more out 
of any hundred that profess it, and has no power to 
restrain greed's impulses; and simply because the 
fact of God-personalness cannot presentize itself in 
the overwhelmingness which the material element 
basin the consciousness of such persons; and that 
even with religious rites and prayers as aids for such 
a presentization. Yes, Jaegger is right. This is the 
actual unexpressed scepticism, grounded in human 
nonsensuousness of God-personalness; and to that 
scepticism is chargeable the hypocrisy that prevails 
so alarmingly in the Church and in society! Here's 
the proof. If frauds can but be covered, crimes but 
remain unpublished, immomlities but be white- 



washed, unfaiths but be screened, — if they can only 
be hidden from the respected, the loved, the ho'n- 
ored, ay, and most from the feared Csesar, Public- 
bo! ho! there's not the slightest compunction as to 
God! And would men that are so anxious to appear 
good and pure before their fellow-men, whom, gener- 
ally, they dc not love any too much, not endeavor to 
live pure and good before the God whom they claim 
to so love, to so honor, to so worship, if that belief in 
God were not a blanc profession? And would the 
Church not be in the State a terror to evil-doers, a 
Christ-militant for the oppressed of any degree, if 
her Credo were not in most of her members a blanc 
profession? Atheism? If that is atheism, then 
there is atheism in the Master's " Swear not by Hea- 
ven; for it is God's throne;" that is to say, it is the 
self-government of God-personalness, and thou canst 
not presentize that prismal fact to thy conscious- 
ness; it is therefore to thee a null. What then? 
"Be thy'^yeOjIiydflUthy nay, nay!' Be therein thee 
that that evidences 'God-personalness outside of thee. 
Be there in the*^ that of which, though thou canst not 
personalize it, thou canst feel its grasp on thy con- 
sciousness. Be there in thee conscience an ruler ! 
And there is conscience; in some, as in hey, and, I 
dare say, in him, a strong conscience. But there's 
the point! Amidst those many sophistries, justifica- 
tions, theories of natural depravity, of vicarious 
atonement, is conscience, in conflict with tempta- 
tion, not likely to be numbed, and permit the facial 
art to lay features into folds of innocence, beneath 
which guilt at first shakes, then is lulled into calm, 
and lastly acts itself as unconcernedly as if it exist 
by right divine? {He rings the bell. Servant en- 
ters.) Tell Mr. Jaegger that I desire to see him in- 
stantly. {Servant exits.) Proof I have none, if guilt 
there be. But I have, in view of their intimacy, the 
right to consider circumstantial evidence. And un- 
der these circumstances the circumstantial evidence 
is in the effect which the belief in natural depravity 
and vicaiious atonement has on conduct in the secre- 
cies of life. Does that belief numb conscience in its 
struggle with temptation ? This is t/ie question. Let 

Jaegger, that keen analysist, that impartial 

{Jaeger enters hastily and angrily. ) 



11 

Jaeggeb {on entering.) — I beg to be excused! I 
know what you want! Therefore I beg to be excused. 
Am I less than a seller of intoxicants? 

Eblebud. — What do you mean? 

Jaegger. — The drunkard enters the liquor room. 
"A drink!" he growls. "You have enough," cries 
the liquor man. "A drink! here's the money!" 
craves the inebriate. "I tell you, you have enough! 
go home! go home!" replies the man of alcohol. -\m 
I less than n seller of intoxicants? 

Erlebud. — Why. Jaegger 

Jaegger. — Do not waste your breath! You have 
already more than enough of that phantasm! And 
where you obtained it is to me a problem! But I do 
not wish to inquire into that. What you need is 
Reason's teachings. Be a man! If you made, or if 
you think you made, a bad bargain, bear it and 
smile at it! make the best of it! 

Eblebud. — Really, you are talking at wild random. 
What I want of you is only an opinion on what is to 
you an abstract topic! 

Jaegger. ---What is it? Pray be brief! 

Eblebud. — What is the most likely effect which the 
Orthodox creed has on conscience, inculcating, as 
that creed does, the belief in natural depravity and 
in vicarious atonement? 

Jabogeb. — Excuse me from answering that! And, 
pray, do not be angry with me! Your face, Erlebud, 
is an index of your innerness, and 

Erlebud.— Is it? That's good. I felt lately like 



16 



ABOUT HELL. 



complaining at Nature for not being able to make the 
face of man the index of his innerness, as you call 
his private consciousness. It now seems that in me 
she evidenced her potency — that is, if you can read 
my innerness on my face. 

Jaeggee. — I can. And I have in many others. 
And learn this : that she in you, as now and then in 
others, shows her potency in that regard, is proof 
that she can do it; and that she doos not do it is 
proof of her wisdom. Where would be the wisdom 
in the ocean's surface showing the monstrosities be- 
neath it ? Pie! The mere thought of being com- 
pelled now and then to look beneath the surface of 
the ocean of human lite gives me the horrors! I 
have no cause to thank that I exist; but since I do ex- 
ist, I thank for the mask «ociety wears. It is the 
highest wisdom that screens the monstrosities of each 
from the gaze of one's fellows. I say "of each." 
None are excepted. The great bard makes even 
Hamlet arraign himsRlf. Hamlet, a very epitome of 
what is best in mankind — an evolution in conscious- 
ness —a cathedral that looks down on shop- 
houses and flashes ligh'nings of divine anger at 
them! 

Eelebud.— And especially at hypocrisy! 

Jaegger. — The touch of madness in him, "^lat 
would you ? At heights like these even a Hamlet be- 
comes dizzy. "Hypocrisy" is a synonym with 
"wisdom!" 

Eelebud. —Please understand that this is no hour 
for the exhibition of intellectual acrobatics! 

Jaeggee. — I never exhibit. I say, is there any 
wisdom in persons exnosing theii* secret criminalties 
before those whom the knowing thereof makes un- 
happy, drives to desperation, to retaliation ? What 
is gained by it except a seed for the growing of re- 
venge ? What is served by it except a revenge alrea- 
dy in tierce blossoming ? 

Eelebud. — Ho, ho! ho, ho! 

Jaeggee. — I am not fond of that institution called 
"Rome:" yet I almost feel like reconciling to it when 
I perceive the healingness whif^h its confessional has 
on that psychal toothache called "conscience." Con- 
fession soothes. It calms. And when it numbs, so 
much the better. Be wise. Do not avenge, revenge ; 
play Brutus. Othello, or what not. As you are not 
strong enough to hold the knowing of it, — if aught 
to be known there be, — calmly, ay. complacently; 
as you cannot build yourself, conforming reasoning- 
ly to facts, whatever they be; as you 

Eelebud. — {Interrupts angrily.) That's enough! 
that's enough! 

Jaeggee. — Thank you. 

{He turns and seats himself at the chess-table, and 
seems instantly absorbed in the chess problem. ) 

Eelebud (aside.) — This is debate no more. This 
is the parader in the battle's action, the manoeuvre's 
drill in the battle's motion. What would I with such 
a man ? Conscience, the supreme bench of the globe, 
holding session in each human being, a psychal 
toothache which to numb, — oh, the blasphemy! Na- 
ture cries against it! Given such a poison to per- 
meate the race for a hundred years, and, self-dis- 
gusted, its genius will seek an explosive to shatter 
the globe! No! no! No numbing, no confessional; 
but justice, ay, avengement ! avengement — nature's 
protest against vice being on a par with virtue, sin 
with purity, devil with Christ! Those passions for 
truths; those hot ravings at dastardities; those burn- 
ing wraths at fraud, at treachery, at wrongs , those 
volcanoes of retribution, — all those are evidence of 
the liery cherubim standing guard at the gates of 
Heaven! And this man — fie! Away from him! I 
myself will judge. I can judge. Calmly, calmly. 
I ignore that issue; I ignore that entirely. I consider 
only evidenced facts. There's the fact of that man's 
influence over her; there's the fact of the impossibili- 
ty of her ceasing her aggression on my cherished 
principles; and there's the possibility — not that; not 



that. I exclude that. Only facts -and those facts. 
Calmly, calmly. It is best that we part. Justice! it 
is only justice! She ought never have deserted from 
her home! She ought never have, under any cir- 
cumstances, exposed herself to — suspicion! We part. 
Let justice rule that the heavens stand! {He exits.) 
( Clirnax. ) 



THIRD PART. 

1 

Jaeggee. — {Alone.) The idiot! the coward! the 
fool! He would have me give an opinion to shield 
himself on the result of some madness he conteai- 
plates! " What effect that creed has on conscience!" 
As if any thinking person cannot, as regards the 
masses, answer that it numbs. Certainly, when the 
moral motors, so-called, are strongly developed, as 
in that woman and in that preacher, they rebound 
from the numbingness which that creed has on them; 
av, they are for that very cause more active. There's 
then very frequently a certain greatness about them; 
they then watch themselves for any little speck of 
what they cnll "sin," and when they believe that 
they detect any, they pounce at it with the noble 
rage of a Newfoundland dog seizing a robber on the 
premises of his master T do admire such. They 
thrill me. And I might have told him that, and 
quieted him. But I did not happen to. I am not 
responsible for the sting he cari'ies. The fool! Why 
did he happen to snap o-top fie! (He shivers in 
disgust ) That again! I to be beset by such a phan- 
tasm! That my antetype ? That 

(He strikes, in a paroxysm of disqust. against a. vase. 
It falls down and breaks. Mrs. Erlebud. attracted by 
the noise, enters. ) 

Mes. Eelebud. — What happened ? 

Jaeggee. — I struck accidentally against that vase. 
The child, I trust, has not been disturbed by the 
noise ? 

Mes. Erlebud. -Not in th<^ ^ligTitest. thank you. 
She is, thank God, fast asleep. (Jaegger is about to 
gather the pieces of the vase.) Please don't trouble 
yourself about gathering the pieces. Nor look dis- 
turbed. Or do you look at it as an omen of evil ? 
We are commanded by the Word of God not to be- 
lieve in omens. Do you believe in the Word of God ? 

(Sfie gatJiers the pieces of th£ broken vase. He aids 
her.) 

Jaeggee. -Madam, I do n( t know what to believe. 
I am in myself of so many contradictions that, look- 
ing at things and persons around ms, I cannot help 
beholding contradictions in them. Yet many things 
and persons, I trust, are agreement in themselves, 
and in agreement with their environments. 

Mrs. Eelebud. — A very candid confession. And, 
sir, I thank you. And, sir, would you think it in- 
hospitable in a woman — a lone woman in the West- 
ern wilds, upon whom depends the defence of her 
home — should she scrutinize those that, strangers to 
her, enter it ? 

Jaeggee. — Madam, I have only admiration for such 
a woman. 

Mes. Eelebud. — Then, sir as 1 am resolved not to 
admit any unchristian influences into my household, 
I would beg you — (The child begins to cry.) Ex- 
cuse me a moment. I'll return immediately. 

{She hurries into the bedroom, and calms the child U> 
sleep. ) 

Jaeggee. — (Alone.) That woman attracts me. She 
has the magnetism of negativeness. Let me cultivate 
this fancy. It will obliterate that phantasm. Yes, I 
will cultivate this fancy. It will be a f«at of art to 
expel that rhapsodic preacher from her confidence 
and install myself instead. It will be a most difficult 
task. So much the better. The more subtlety, the 



ABOUT HELL. 



17 



better! (He touches the hell. Servant enters. ) Tell my 
valet to send here the flowers he purchased to-day. 
{Servant Ixncs and exits.) Q-reed! What of that? 
Am I n<)t a human being? Besides, a greed like that 
ceai?es to be greed. 'Tis a most select fancy, fit for 
such like me. 'Tis so near reason a» to be reason. 
It «7i7? be reason, gamboling itself in ousting phan- 
tasms. That such a woman be held in the thraldom 
of such a slavishness is wrong, wrong, wrong! And 
I do chafe at it ! And if, with my might I can make 
a right, it is my duty to make it. And there's that 
wretch torturing the poor woman with his vulgar 
jealousy! Oh! I begin to believe that he will have 
a divorce alter all. 'Tis well. I dare say he will, on 
the sober second thought, hurl himself at me as his 
foe. Let him dare it. I will tame him. 'Tis 
well as it is. Let them for a while be divorced. I 
will unpassiohize them- -him and her. And then 
they shall remarry. There's work for me, select 

work, work of art, of the subtlest of all arts! 

(Servant enters mth flowers.) Arrange those flowers 
around that sleeping boy. Gently. Do not wake 
him. (The servant arranges, under Jaegger's direc. 
tions, theflmcers around the boy.) And bring me that 
book; middle row, top shelf, third volume. [The 
servant brings the de.nred book.) Good. Tell my valet 
not to pack tny trunks to-day. You may go. (Serv- 
ant exits. Jaegger opens the volume.) "Inferno," the 
phantasm by an Italian madman! Let me kindle at 
it, and gallop at onr^ eff'ort into her confidence! (He 
reads for abmtt five minutes. Mrs. Erlebud is seen get- 
ting Vu chiM to sleep by hummiivj a song. ) 



J.vEQGER. — (Thrmrs down the volume.) A divine 
folly by a divine madman! Out on such poets! a 
most miserable set are they when they make the past 
a hotbed for their phantasy, and bring forth things 
like that "Inferno!" And, too, to hold them to the 
present as a warning! Out on such folly! 'Tis rea- 
son's labor lost! Why not, rather, sing the future to 
the present, sing the great hope, sing the endingness 
of existence, the universal Nirwana? Ay, that; and 
teach patience in the meantime: teach wisdom; thou 
that art bom to poverty, be content in thy condition; 
do not strive to be wealthy, to be high, to be 
great; thou that art born to wealth, do not strive to 
increase it, n^r thy influence, nor thj' honors; do not 
oppress, tyrannize, plunder the noor; and thou that 
art born a genius, do not swing thy comet-tail dis- 
turbingly into conditions of society as they happen 
to be! Let us have no contentions, no violences, no 
revolutions! But such poets, with their bitter bene- 
volence^ exhaling itself in such gigantic buildery! 
'Tis sickening to look at it. That Italian's especial- 
ly. I dare say, he fondly believed to be able to 
bring his generation to the blush by satirizing, as he 
did in that Infei'no, thehell-belief in general, and this 
and that vice, and this and that person in especial. 
And his generation rer.d and jeered, " There goes 
the man that has been in hell!" The divine simple- 
ton! As if satire's pointitude can penetrate the thick 
hide of superstition that binds the Thought of the 
vulgar masses when their own common sense, en- 
sconced in that Thought, cannot break through and 
scatter it! A hell other than this our human exist- 
ence! A vast domain somewhere in space ruled by a 
devil-person and peopled by souls in eternal torture, 
and an AU-mercifnl and All-mighty God beholding 
those tortures, yet notending them! and that, too, when 
those souls are so tortured because of sins for which, 
since they have been, as claimed, born in and with sin, 
they are not accountable! And here is human justice 
withholding itself from punishing a person even for 
having committed a capital crime when such person 
is morally unaccountable! and here's human mercy 
titriviag to annul pain even in those that, because of 



their own licentiousness, suffer physically! Anaes- 
thetics are invented, and on Boston's Common stands 
a statue to honor the inventor; and laudations are 
given to a God for that benefaction, but oh, the con- 
tradiction! To the God to whom those laudation.s 
for that benefaction are given they deny the power 
or the will to be so pain-abrogating, so pain-annuU- 
ing, so merciful! Out on that! "Tis sickening to 
look at that greed of hate resolving itself into a phan- 
tasm that would seize eternity to feed its delight at 
torturing helpless beings, and then throw the res- 
ponsibility for there being tortures on a blanc phan- 
tasm! Let me turn from it to my newest fancy. I 
begin to feel a zest in this. Good. Society owes all 
a living, and a zest for living ; and as I cannot find 
zest in the usual avocations — (He shivers in self-dis- 
gust.) Fie! I, a tramp! Out on this disgustive in- 
trospection! 'tis growing on me. I must weed it out 
of me; I must; I must. (Mrs. Erlebud comes from tlie 
bedroom.) She comes. I am mvself again. (She 
stops and contemplates the boy. ) A graceful thing, in- 
deed. Poets, painters, sculptors, where are ye? "A 
mother listening to the breathings of her boy!" (Sh^ 
comes slowly towards the parlor. ) What keen, watch- 
ful eyes! I will hold to them, forget myself in them. 
To forget— ah, the great cure for the curse of exist- 
ence! Ay, to forget all, except such avenues of lustre! 
(She enters.) 



Ms. Eelebud. — Now, Mr. Jaegger, I am ready to 
have a frank conversation with you. 

JaeCtGer. — Madam, you are very kind. 

Mps. Erlebud.— But what ails you? You don't 
seem well. 

Jaegger. — I looked a moment ago at Dante's " In- 
ferno." 

Mrs. Erlebud. — And? 

Jaegger- -And that somewhat disturbed the usual- 
ly placid currents of my mind. 

Mrs. Erlebud.- -Ah! 

Jaegger. — But permit me to remark, concerning 
the subject that so justly engrosses you, that as far as 
any influence of mine on Mr. Erlebud is concerned, 
it is not worth the while to confide to you my mind 
about the topics of the day. 

Mrs. Erlebud. —Permit me to qualify my motive. 
Apparently it's a selfish one. inasmuch as in being 
anxious to know your convictions, I seem not to care 
for the salvation of your own soul, but only for that 
of my husband. Sir, be assured of the contrary. 
But in manner as I would be incapable of saving 
others if I myself were not in condition fit to be 
saved, so must I see first to the salvation of my hus- 
band; for are not husband and wife one? 

Jaegger. — Madam, I have seen enough of the world 
not to know and appreciate rare motives like yours; 
and I have often wished that I likewise were pos- 
sessed of that profound sympathy with, and anxiety 
for, the spiritual welfare of my tellow-beings. But I 
am not so possessed. I am, in this regard, a poor 
man, ay, a pauper who looks admiringly, wistfully, 
even «ntiously at his wealthy fellow-beings. But 
what can I do? I must content myself with being as 
I am. And so I read, I paint, I discuss history, 
philosophv, science, poetry, art, religion, social prob- 
lems; but whatever convictions on some of those I 
may have, are far from enthusiasting me for mission- 
ism in their behalf. On the contrary, I abstain as 
carefully as I can from influencing any one. 

Mrs, Erlebud. — Why should you? Is your influ- 
ence, in your judgment, not wholesome? 

Jaegger. — What is wholesome? That that makes 
one feel in wholeness with one's self and environ- 
ments. Why should I disturb any one's belief in 
anything when that belief gives that one a sense of 
that wholeness— as far as that phase of life is con- 



18 



ABOUT HELL. 



cerned that is affected by that belief? And if there 
be a disturbance in any one's belief, why should I 
increase it ? 

Mbs. EbIjKbud. — And you cMm to have convic- 
tions ? 

Jaeqqeb. — Madam, you desired trankness. I re- 
peat, I decline to add to any one's self-disturbance 
by making them partake of mine. 

Mbs. Ebleetjd.— You, then, have no convictions? 

Jaeogee.— If none I had, would I be in self-dis- 
turbance ? 

Mes, Eblebud. — You are then irresponsible? 

Jaegger. — Madam! 

Mbs. Eblebud. — As far as duty to your fellows is 
concerned ? 

Jaeggeb. — I humbly confess it. I decline to take 
upon myself the responsibility of disturbing any 
one's belief; and so I select as companions men 
whose receptivity is almost a zero by the side of their 
expansivity. Such a quality I found in Mr. Erie- 
bud! We met by chance in Europe, and travelled 
together for several weeks. After parting we cor- 
responded. Lately I returned, and found at my 
banker's his invitation to visit him, and, having no 
knowledge of his marital troubles, I accepted it. Im- 
agine my surprise at finding in him a man in judg- 
ment with himself. What could I do ? Depart in- 
stantly ? I am not a coward. Give him advice ? I 
advise no one. What, then ? I compromised. I re- 
mained, but I abstained from saying aught that 
might in any manner have influenced him one way 
or the other. Except this: he was at times so morbid 
as to necessitate humoring him in his notions. Par- 
don me for mentioning it. It needs not your tears 
to convince me as to who is to blame in this disturb- 
ance — now so happily ended. I beg you cease your 
tears! Must I always cause tears when I would 

Mbs. Eblebud. — {^Interrupts.) Don't, I beg you, 
distress yourself. You misinterpret my emotion. I 
weep at the misery my husband experienced. I 
thank you for any comfort you brought him. And I 
thank the Lord my God, that He answered my pray- 
ers for him. What else could I do for him but pray ? 
I had no other weapon to oppose Satan's power over 
him. When I married him he was a Liberal, so- 
called; and that I married him was not only because 
I loved him, but because I would in him snatch a 
burning brand from hell. The Rev. Mr. Metaphos 
also claimed my hand, but he, too, renounced me 
for sake of reclaiming Mr. Erlebud. But soon after 
our marriage he introduced his infidel, blaspheming 
friends into our household, and was I to listen in my 
own house to blasphemies against the Lord, my God ? 
Not I. I forbade them my house. But he met them 
at infidel clubs, theatres, and other ungodly resorts. 
What else than prayers could I then oppose to that? 
Meekly, beseechingly was I to him for years. Never 
an angry word did I give him. And he saw me on 
my knees day by day, praying that the Holy Ghost 
move him, that he live not a thorn in the heart of 
Christ, a torment to the Lord, my God! Yet he grew 
cold to me. He even expelled me from his confi- 
dence. Yet would I have borne with him patiently, 
prayerfully, until the end of my days on earth. But 
as soon as my Archie's mind began to develop, hs 
took him from my care and to instill infidel poison 
into him. Was I not to battle against that ? Was I 
to see my boy, whom I have consecrated to the Lord, 
become a foe to Christ? No! a thousand times, no! 
And so I asked counsel of Brother Metaphos. He 
gave it, — and I fled with my children. Could I act 
otherwise ? 

Jaeggeb. — Certainly not. Having those convic- 
tions — {Stops.) 

Mbs. Eblebud. — Sir, my religious convictions are 
my very life. My anguish at possible Doubt — Satan's 
weapon, as Mr. Metaphos calls it— tells me that. But 
I am firmly grounded in my convictions. I know 
more of a surety that the Lord, my God, liveth, and 



that His Christ liveth, than that I myself live! For 
am I else than a shadow, a fleeting cloud, a breath 
that is breathed, and is no more? And He a»d His 
Christ, are they not eternal and forever? I knowiheX 
He is All-love, All-grace, All-goodness, and that I am 
all sin, with no grace of myself, unable of myself of 
any act except of sin! Yet loves He boundlessly sin- 
born man! Like a father, suffering for the errors, 
and with the sufferings of his children, suffiers the 
Lord, our God, with the souls in sin and condemned 
to hell! Oh, for the sufferings of the Lord, our God, 
and of His Christ! When I think of them I pray to 
God to accept me as a sacrifice for all, to place upon 
me the sufferings of all, to extinguish me from his 
everlasting memory, to cause me to be no more, to 
sink me into oblivion eternal that He have no an- 
guish in seeing me suffer! This, sir, is my faith! 
And can I see any one in danger of hell, and not 
labor for the Lord's sake as well as his own, to save 
him? And am I to see my own children become a 
thorn in the heart of Christ ? 

Jaeggeb. — Mrs. Erlebud, your view astounds me. 
It is more than novel —it is unselfishness itself. It 
enraptures me. Do you permit me to confide to 
you? 

Mbs. Eblebud. — Why, I solicited— (Stops.) 

Jaeggeb. — To legitimize myself? 

Mbs. Eblebud. — No more of that, I beg you. Con- 
fide to me like to a sister. 

Jaeggeb. — Thank you. An hour ago Mr. Hodin- 
ger charged me with being to each person as each 
happens to be. 

Mrs. Eblebud. — Ob, that man! May God hare 
mercy on his soul! 

Jaeggeb. — And yet the charge is a true one! 

Mbs. Erlebud. — Ah! 

Jaeggeb. -I am like the youth who, declining to 
take upon himself the yoke of matrimony, feels at 
liberty to see some charm or other in every woman 
he meets ; ay, he even swears, as one at a time he ad- 
dresses, that she surpasses all others he knows. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — You. so untruthful! 

Jaeggeb. — Am I not truthful in confessing it? 

Mrs. Eblebud. —That is certainly a merit. But — 
but— go on! 

Jaegger —And that young man is really not un- 
truthful, if duty is truth in activeness. And that it 
is. Now, it is a duty to make life as pleasant as it 
c*n be 

Mrs. Erlebud. — {Interrupts.) But not through lie, 
treachery, or any sinful method! 

Jaeggeb. — Certainly not. And that young man is 
not, in that, guilty of either lie, treachery, or any 
sinful method. He sees a charm in every woman he 
meets. What sin is there in that? He expresses to 
her his admiration, and delights her by so doing. 
What sin is there in that ? 

Mbs. Eblebud. — None, as I can see; but— but — a 
man may fail to admire a woman, though she de- 
serve admiration, and still not endanger his soul, 
while, if he has not the true faith, he is in danger of 
hell! 

Jaeggeb. — My present purpose is to show myself 
justified in being to each one as he or she happens 
to be. 

Mb8. Eblebud. —Please go on! 

Jaeggeb. — There is beneath that youth's admira- 
tion for many women a rebellion against his matri- 
monial scepticism; The law of gravitation, showing 
itself in its highest phase in the affinitive elements 
of the human being, acts in that youth as a motor 
for seeking the fixity of conjugal life; and so he ad- 
mires many women, and honestly so; but he, at the 
same time, looks for one bright, particular star to 
make him an Eden on earth! 

Mbs. Eblebud.— I now understand how you are to 
each as each happens to be, and yet are consistent. 
Did you so explain yourself to — to 

Jaeggeb. -To Mr. HodingerJ 



ABOUT HELL. 



19 



Mbs. Eblebud. — As the Lord is my witness, I bear 
him no revenge; but I would like to see his conceit 
humbled! 

Jaegoee. — I did not think it worth the while. And 
thus I perceive in every faith, in every philosophy, 
in every theory more or less to admire, but not 
enough to accept either In full. I am thus a sceptic, 
a rebel against the yoke of belief, of creed. It then 
seems to me that to be unfixed, changeful, living 
only in the impulses of the hour, making most of 
life, is the law of life! And for the time during 
which I succeed in keeping my thought disporting 
itself by swimming a circle and the circle's radia, I 
feel easy enough. I even beguile myself into believ- 
ing that mind's infinity consists but in that circling. 
But human thought cannot be always circling, dis- 
porting itself. When it darts the straight line from 
"Whence?" to "Whither?" it finds itself limited, 
tethered, and at its tether's end! Then the awful 
problem of existence rises awfully before me! Then 
I am moved to the very core of my being! Memory 
then arises! Ah! much is there recorded with the 
furies' ink ! 

Mbs. Eblebud. — You? 

Jaeooek. — Madam, ask yourself, is there a human 
being 

Mbs. Eblebud. — {Interrupts.) Go on! I am pro- 
foundly interested! 

Jaeggeb. — Then a tempest rages m me— a black- 
faced, open-jawed, fiery-tongued, h=iteeyed tempest 
— engulphing all the biittresses of life! That broken 
vase! were that but all the wreck of that tempest's 
fury! 

Mbs. Eblebud. — (Svmpathizingly.) Oh! 

Jaeooeb. — And always thus when portraitures of 
hell present themselves, like, as just now, Dante's 
"Inferno," I ask, is Dante the Cassandra of man- 
kind ? Is he a peeper through the cracks of time ? 
Is he a hearer of the crack of doom ? Or is he a mad- 
man ? A madman! an insane man! Is it possible 
that there can be such a method in insanity? Sure- 
ly, such a method's labor would annihilate the in- 
sanity, and then dissolve itself on finding that it had 
architectnrized insane phantasms! Is it possible that 
those gigantic seeings are as baseless as the delirium 
tremens of the drunkard ? The delirium of the 
drunkard! What surety have we that even that is 
not a spiritual reality? Observe the drunkard! He 
runs from what he sees! He begs, implores, shrieks! 
He would shrink into himself to flee fr -m it. In 
vain! Flee to where he can — into the arms of his be- 
loved, into church, to the altar, into all the safe- 
guards of human and divine provision — all in vain! 
The sky is blue, yet he sees but a fiery glare! Around 
him friends are gathered, eager to calm him; yet he 
sees but monster beasts that gloat at him, strike at 
him — serpents that coil around him; that hiss, hiss, 
hiss, hiss! Oh, the torture! Oh, the horror! Who 
can witness it and not shrink from ever being a 
soul? 

Mbs. Eblebud.— Oh, for the sufferings of the poor, 
tortured souls! 

Jaeggeb.— Here's the point. What surety have we 
that what he sees is not a spiritual reality ? What if 
there is in space an immense fire domain, peopled 
by countless kinds of monsters of fire substance — 
monsters with the hideous shapes of the periods when 
the universe struggled in primitive self-formation's 
labor — the unknown monsters of antedeluvia — the 
monsters of the sea, of the forest, of the desert -the 
monsters of the human race -monsters from the 
moon, from the stars, from the suns — the hideous 
shapes that now and then in nightmares torture 
the sleeper, in dreams horrify, in imagination chill 
the marrow of consciousness — all those acting their 
instincts, their greed, their passions, their hates, 
their destructiveness, the brutally strongest ruling — 
beast spirits ruling man-souls — souls ever in agony 
of the birdling fascinated by a boa, or in the agony 



of a human being seized by a devilf — ! {He suddenly 
stops, shivering in a paroxysm of disgust.) 

{Mrs. Erlebud nses anxiously, and hurries totoa/rds 
Jaegger; the child in the bedroom suddenly begins cry- 
ing; Mrs. Erlebud is undecided for a few moments whe- 
ther to assist Jaegger or to run to the child; Jaegger 
seems to recover; she runs to the child, and is seen to 
calm it; Jaegger soon regains his composure. ) 

Jaeggeb. — (Alone.) A curse on that phantasm! And 
if it again intrude itself, I — {Shivers in disgust.) 
Quick! Something else to think of ! that great wo- 
man! Ay, she is great; unselfish like the Martyr-God! 
Let me say it; I do envy those people their enthusiasm. 
'Tis ignorance in white heat of Thought's cosmic labor; 
but 'tis positive in what it asserts as its cosmic funda- 
mentalties. Matter, soul, devil, God — each an actual 
entity! butKeason! Beason, in the metaphysicist's cos- 
mic labor, has doubt as its fundamentalty; it doubts 
the material actualty of what is sentiated as mate- 
rial, doubts its own self and all else as actualty, and 
then, to evidence itself and all else to itself, it 
builds gigantic systems of metaphysics — pyramids 
of labyrinth that have the merit of etre raison 
without that of raison d''etre! Out on such! 'tis worse 
than that Italian's, worse than reason's labor lost! 
'tis Beason itself lost to itself! Out on that! and most 
on that petty reason, sophistry! that is a bawd sitting 
at the city's gates, and ready to do menial service to 
all that enter under greed's banners; that is a petty 
lawyer weaving loopholes in the ermine of cosmic 
majesty of equity; that is reason as a lacquey; ay, 
worse, as a prince herding swine voluntarily, not, 
like in these people, a prince clad in sharp-edged and 
close-wedged armor, and, under waving pennants of 
lordly crudeness, ot kingly childishness, building 
battlements and towers, and doing valiant battle! I 
do envy these people. Theirs is wisdom ensconced 
in folly, and outgrowing it; mine is folly ensconced 
in wisdom, and devouring it! I do envy them. That 
one especially. A great woman! Unselfish like the 
very Martyr-God, and linking herself, without know- 
ing it, to the highest selves of existence, while I — 
fie! I, so low, vi'ith no goal of life to steer to— with 
no height of life to rise to — a polished shell, a pau- 
per, a devilf- ! {He faints. Mrs. Erlebud re-enters. 
She hurries to him. ) 

Mes. Eblebxid. - Mr. Jaegger, what ails you? {He 
makes no reply. She strikes the bell. ) 

Jaeggeb — {Reviving.) No, no! No servant! Or, 
yes— a glass of water! 

Meh. Eblebud. I myself will give you water. 
{Servant enters. She addresses him.) Thank you. I 
need you no more. {Servant exits. She pours from 
a pitcher water into a glass, and gives it to him. ) 

Jaegger. — Thanks. {He rises and walks Uneards t?ie 
door. ) 

Mes. Eelebud. — Where are you going? 

Jaeggeb. — To my rooms, madam. 

Mes. Eelebud. Are you better ? 

Jaegger. — Thanks, madam. I am better. I am 
frequently thus afflicted ; but, fortunately, those spells 
last only a few moments. An hour of sleep gives me 
back to myself. 

Mes. Eblebud. — May you, sir, be given back to 
Him whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light! 

Jaeggeb. -Thanks, madam. 

Mes. Eelebud. — May I, on my husband's return, 
send him to your room ? 

Jaeggeb. -Do not, I beg you, alarm him. Madam, 
I beg you to accept the assurance of my profoundest 
respect, and to receive me into your kind remem- 
brance. {She bows. He exits. ) 



Mes. Eblebud. — {Alo7ie.) The poor man! the home- 
less, wandering soul! May I, O Lord, be privileged 
to lead him as an offering o* joy to — {The child »ud- 



20 



ABOUr HELL. 



clenly begins to cri/. She ram into the bedroom, takes 
the chili and returm to the librarxj. She seats herself 
intrt a rocking -chair, close to the sleeping boy. Pause of 
a few moments. Miss Erlebud suddenly enters the par- 
lor. She is sobbing audibly. Mrs. Erlebud rises and 
enters the parlor.) Yoa? What's the mitter? Is 
Beanie — ( Slis stops. ) 

Miss 'EnhKBaD.— {Sobbing.) Yes. Bennie — (Stops.) 

Mrs. Eblebud.— What? Siok? Or dead? Now, 
do tell me. Dead ? Well, the Lord has given, the 
Lord has taken. Blessed be the name of the Lord! 

Miss Erlebud. — No, no; not dead! Would he were 
dead! Yes, rather dead than — oh, Sasie! 

Mrs. Erlebud.— Than what? 

Miss Erlebud. — Oh, Susie! I can't tell you. Can't 
you guess ? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Whafs the use of guessing when 
you can tell me? Has he killed any one? 

Miss Erlebud. — Oh, it was that fiend that mad- 
don ed him! 

Mrs. Erlebud.— What fiend ? 

Miss Erlebud. —Mr. Jaegg'^v. I saw such a wicked 
leer in his siyes! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — You do the gentleman wrong. 
But what has happened? 

Miss Erlebud. — Susie, T'U cling to you while there's 
a breath in my body ! Though you should drive 
me— (Mrs. Erlebud lays down the child, and takes 
her hat.) 

Mrs. Erlebud. —I suppose I must find out myself! 

Miss Erlebud. — Susan Erlebud, you are a divorced 
woman! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Divor Oh! 

Miss Erlebud. — Susie, be strong! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — But — but — the Lord be thauked! 
T was afraid Bennie had killed someone. He is so 
hasty! Some water, Aggie, dear! 

Miss Erlebud. — Susie! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Well, the Lord knows best. It's 
hard on me, but the Lord knows best. 

Miss Erlebud. — Lillie — see to Lillie! 

(Miss Erlebud runs to the child, and caresses her pas- 
sionately. ) 

Mrs. Erlebud.— You are so good, Aggie! It does 
me so much good to see you so good! I 3uj)pose I 
had better now get my things! 



(Metaphos enters.) 

Metaphos. — Sister ! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Brother! 

Metaphos. — On the way to the court-house I and 
Miss Erlebud met my wife and a lady frieud of hers. 
We stopped for a few moments' exchan2:e of civilities, 
but my wife's friend having mentioned Mr. Jaegger 
as a person whom she has known since his child- 
hood, and I and Miss Erlebud being prompted by 
curiosity to know about him, we tarried a few min- 
utes instead of moments. And so, on entering the 
court-house, we met Mr. Erlebud rushing out of it 
like one possessed by a devil. He wouldn't stop to 
answer Miss Erlebud's call. Somehow I felt my 
heart beating faintly; but on we kept, and, on enter- 
ing the court-room, we heard the decree of divorce 
rendered. Our counsel was astounded at the sud- 
den change of Mr. Erlebud's disposition; but, that 
being the case, and the charge of desertion laeing 
sustained against you, the Court decreed divorce. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Well, the Lord knows best. 

Metaphos. — Come, sister Susan, come! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I don't like to wake ths boy. 

Metaphos. —You, then, haven't been told all? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — What else to be known is there ? 

Metaphos. — The Court has given the boy to him! 

Mrs. Eelebud. — My boy! No! no! 

^Metaphos. — The girl remains with you. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — "The boy to him? Never! As God 
liveth, I'll not leave my boy here! 



Miss Erlebud. — Susie, be strong! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I am strong in t!ie Lord, my God! 
Lo, the floods pass over me ; yet under the floods I 
feel the arms of the Lord holding me! Lord, I 
stretch my arms for my boy! 

Metaphos. — Sister, have faith! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I Jiave faith. And my faith in my 
works will I show! That boy shall not remain with 
him! I have dedicated him to the Lord. 

Metaphos. — The Lord will provide for his soul! 

Mrs. Erlebud.— He won't if I don't see to it. 
It's laid on me, and I must do it. And I will do 
it! 

Metaphos. —Do what ? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Save him. 

Metaphos. — Would you rebel against the law? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — (In a sudden and momei\t4t,m an- 
ger.) There's no law in the land! Now! 

Met.aphos. — Too much law, sister; too much in 
books and too little in the people. Come, sister! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Let me tarry a few moments. 

(Mrs. Erlebud sits listlessly down, I'ises, walks abotit, 
and sits ilown again. Miss Erlebud is sobbing.) 

Metaphos. — (Gonfinues.) Yes, there's too much 
law in the land and too little justice, too much legal- 
ity and too little morality, too much form aad too 
littlo soul! Linison line, statute on statute, form on 
form! A ship with masts, and spars, and jibbooms, 
and ropes, and pulleys, but rigged with sails made 
of cloth of wiie, and moved by trade-winds of avar- 
ice and hurricanes of pa.ssion! That's the ship of 
State! And that's, largely, the ship of Church! 
Rigged with sails of network of wire instead with 
sails made of cloth of flax— of beams of light mixed 
with soil of the earth^'instead of with the white sails 
of love, the bright sails of faith, the sweet sails of 
Christ, to catch the winds of God. the breezes of 
heaven! "Save himself that can!" That's the State 
decalogue rendered in one line! He that can save 
himself survives! he that survives is the strongest, 
the fittest, the good, the best! that's the latest logic 
of the "accidental, non-responsible, all-nght-any- 
how religion!" Religion, thut? Yes, Satan's reli- 
gion! The strongest, the fittest ? Look at it! There's 
a tenement on fire, and a struggle of the tenants to 
escape. Among them is a woman, a pale-faced, slen- 
der, little woman, a widow woman, a mother of chil- 
dren, a supporter of thsir young lives, a teacher of 
their young souls, an exam pier to her neighbor.'^, a 
glory to God! Look at her as she, with a chil "1 in 
each arm, straggles to escape from the grasp of the 
fl imes! She has almost reached the street, but lo! a 
burly loafer, likewise struggling to escape, would 
crowd himself past her! there is now a struggle be- 
tween that woman and that churl— a struggle to es- 
cape—and the churl throws her and her children 
down ! She and her children are trampled to 
death, while the burly loafer escapes, survives — 
to sell rum, to poison men to mar homes, to plun- 
der God! Answer, now! Which was the fittest to 
survive? Answer! Or observe here men of honor 
struggling life's battle, open as the face of day, yet 
ruined by foxes in human shape! Observe there 
men of the ideal striving, upright as the holy ladder, 
yet hounded and marred by lawless gangs in wanton 
mischief's works! Or see yonder men of genius' 
labor, true as the polar star, plundered of their labor's 
fruitage, that thievish rascals survive in the plunder! 
Answer, now, which are the fittest to survive — the 
men of honor or the human foxes? The men of 
labor or the thievish rascals? Oh, ye warriors of 
duty — ye that fight the good fight — ye men that are 
Woman— ye women that are Man— if in the fight ye 
go, fighting, under, ye are victors though Satan's yell 
of triumph strikes your last hearing! or if the fight 
ye yield, and still live, hold to the comforter in ye! 
hold to the Holy Spirit in ye! hold to that, and ye 
are comforted! for the law will not comfort ye— the 
Stato will not comfort ye —society will not comfort ye 



ABOUT HELL. 



21 



philosophy will uot comfort ye- science will uot com- 
fort ye — and, least of all, those scientists, with their 
claimed "law" of the survival of the fittest! Ho, ho! 
Law in the swindler's cunning getting an advantage 
over honest simplicity ? Law m treachery ? Law in 
injustice ? Law in public cowardice ? Law in brutal 
strength? Law in murder? Tiaw in a hyena tearing 
a herder? Law in a hawk clawing a dove? Law in 
a pirate plundering a hard-wrought treasure ? Law 
iu a savage scalping a pioneer? Law in survivals by 
lawlessness, by non-law? 

(He stops a moment. Mrs. Erlebud sits listlessly. 
Miss Erlebud sobs violently. He continues:) 

Look at yonder dove! She is clawed, and lo! she 
bends her head like the Savior on the Cross, while he 
struts about like a champion! A champion is he in- 
dee(^-*a champion in the race to hell! He will get 
there! he is ticketed for it! he has the ticket on his 
brow— the Cain's mark! He will go right through — 
no stoppage — no asking to show his ticket! he will 
run to it — he will fly to it — ceaseless, restless! On! 
on! on! a burning conscience — the black coal of guilt, 
ignited in friction with soul, placing him in the fore 
fires of hell! his soul on fire, and fanned by the wings 
of the morning, by the winds of the noon, by the 
zephyrs of the evening, by the motion: of the hours, 
of the days, of the seasons, of the year4>burning! burn- 
ing! And the black coal of guilt, now luridly burn- 
'Qg. generates to steam the tears of his repentance — 
drives him on, on, on — ceaseless, restless — from city 
to city, from land to land, from sea to sea — the labor 
of men giving him hate, the sheen of worlds giving 
him wrath, the --ongs of the spheres giving him fury! 
Ou! on! on! restless, ceaseless! At last his body faints 
— be is stretched on his death-bed — the dark veil is 
falling on his eyes — the weight of the tomb sinks on 
his heart — the grip O'" the grave seizes his pulse! 
And oh. for him no Jesus — for him no divine lamb 
slain — for him no Savior on the Cross — but in his 
still gleaming memory ari«e the poetries and melo- 
dies he once did sing, the hopes and aspirations he 
once was moved by, the loves and friendships he 
onoe did live in — they all luise to him in forms ol 
woe faced sweetues-, and float around him in the 
sabled motions of the dirge that burns deeper than 
all the fires of hell he had been in — tho dirge "Oh, 
hadst thou but never been ! for never more wilt thou 
behold "s smiling as on thy morn we smiled— never 
more! never more! never more!" Fainter and fainter 
sees he, hears he! At last he sighs "Rest! death! 
end!" Ho! what's that? A rolume of sounds like 
the pandemonium of Babel! Louder! louder! an 
ocean of living tire! each drop of that ocean a soul, 
roaring, rearing, tearing, whirling, twirling, shriek- 
ing, groaning, moaning — Hell!! myriads on my- 
riads, countless myriads of burning souls, of eternal 
furies! And hieh on thrones of scarlet fire grin Lil- 
lith, Ashtaroth, Dagon, Baal, Moloch, Juggernaut, 
and all the other devil princes! and over all grins 
Satan! ! There he, that miserable man, forever, for- 
ever, forever! But she! She, a saint on earth, in 
communion with all the saintliness of earth, in sad 
mourning for all the sins of earth, in peace amidst 
all the wiles of earth, in holy patience for her end on 
earth! At last her end on earth i.s on hand! then 
earth and. all the worlds sing to her the Savior's last 
song on earth, "It is done!" And like a mother 
holding her babe at the baptismal font, earth holds 
that woman's soul at the baptifstrv of Heaven! There 
John the Baptist! there Paul! there Peter! there the 
apostles, the prophets, the martyrs, the angels, the 
cherubim, the ophanim, the countless hosts of hea- 
ven, singing the great hallelujah at her baptism — 
singing '' Kfulosh, Sanctus, Holy" in never-ending 
variations- singing before the b'lessed Jesus as He 
sits at the right hand of the Father! Hallelujah! 
Kadosh, Sanctns, Holy! no endings! no endings! And 
she one of the eternal choir! forever! forever! forever! 
She in heaven! he in hell! Hallelujah! there's justice! 



there's hell! God be praised! there's hell! Hallelu- 
jah! {He stops.) 

Miss Erlebud. — (Agonized.) Oh, Mr. Metaphos! 
(^Mrs. Erlehid still sits listlessly ) 

Metaphos. — (To Mrs. Erlebud.) Take comfort, sis- 
ter! take comfort! He'll get there! he'll get there! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Won't he come soon? 

Metaphos. — Do you still mean to see him ? 

Mrs. Erlebud.— Why shouldn't I? Mustn't I? 
Isn't he in trouble? Poor Bennie! He'll be awfully 
shocked, I know. 

Miss Erlebud. — What's that? 

Mrs. Erlebud.— Aggie, dear, don't excite me. 
Don't be angry at Brother Metaphos for being angry 
at Bennie. What's to be done to save him ? I can 
save the boy, and I will save him. But I don't see 
how I can save Bennie. What's the use of my being 
in heaven, if Bennie is to be in hell ? I'll run away 
from heaven to be near him in hell! I can't see how 
the Lord can permit any erring creature to be so tor- 
tured, or in danger of it, and not drag him out by 
the hair, if necessary ; and He can do it, too, if He 
has a mind to. I suppose it's so predestinated. But, 
then, it's queer, anyhow! Well, the Lord knows 
best. 

Miss Erlebud. — Sweet woman! you have, without 
knowing it, answered Mr. Metaphos. 

Metaphos.— Come, sister, come! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Won't he come soon? I'd like to 
have him look for a few momentp at — at 

(A servant enters.) 

Servant. — {To Miss Erlebud. ) Mr. Erlebnd desires 
to see you in the red parlor. 

Miss Erlebud. — I'll see him in a moment. 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I knew he would come. Tell him 
I forgive him and his friends. Father, forgive them, 
for they know not what they do! 

Miss Erlebud. — Don't go before you see me return. 
{She lays the child on the sofa and exits. ) 

Metaphos — I'll get a carriage. Will you be ready 
on my return ? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — I'll be ready. (He exits.) 



Mqs. Erlebud. — (Alone.) I must do it. It's laid 
on me. I must do it. I have consecrated him to the 
Lord, and he sha'nt be defiled. He sha'nt live on 
earth a thorn in the heart of Christ and a torment to 
God. Let the Lord take him ere Satan nestles in 
him. {She quickly locks tlie parlor and lih'ary doors 
that lead to the rotunda. She then looks about as if 
seeking something. At last she finds a carving-knife on 
the sideboard. She seizes the knife and runs to the boy. 
She kneels down.) Lord, receive him at my hands as 
Thou wouldst hive received Isaac had it not been 
Thy will to revoke Thy command. I ask it in the 
Savior's name. Amen. (She is about to cut his throat 
when the boy awakes. She drops the knife.) 

Archie. — Ma, where's pa ? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — He's gone out, dear. Lay down, 
darling, and go to sleep. 

Archie. — Is he gone to buy the little pony he pro- 
mised me? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Go to sleep, darling, and when 
you'll wake you'll see the most beautiful pony there 
is! And it will have wings, too! And it will take 
you straight to heaven! 

Archie. — Why, ma, I hain't never seen no pony 
with wings! 

Mrs. Erlebud. — You'll see one when you'll wake 
up; but you must say your prayers, darling. 

Archie. — Will the little pony with wings be here if 
I say my prayers ? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Yes, darling. 

Archie. — Sure? 

Mrs. Erlebud. — Sura. 

Archie. —Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the 
Loi'd my soul to keep. Amen. 



24 



ABOUT HELL. 



chorals would then breathe each one's eagerness for 
the paroxysm of such a metamorphosis! Mortal man 
would then forget to ask "Is life worth the living'" 
Ay, in such an ending, even if an ending, life would 
be worth the thanks and the prayer that it repeat it- 
selt in QJx61ess~{Hodirvjer ejiters hastily.) 

HoDiNGEE.— What has happened? All sorts of ru- 
mors — 

{Jaegger looks at him, but makes no reply. Hodinner 
enters the library, and closes the door. ) 

Ji.EGQZR.~{Alone.) Ay, life would then be worth 
the living! but the passing cff by corpse-decomposi- 
tion—the ghastliness of that feeding of. that myriad- 
headed jackal on the human form divine— the foul 
crumbling of the flesh--the horrid tints of the carcass 
—the stench— the— fie! fie! Yes, a curse, a curse- 
nothing in me in such an hour to show why I exist- 
no labor to add to labor universal-no goal to steer 
'°~L^~*~^°^ *aint I feel! This nausea of the battle 
ot this madhouse unmans me. Ami responsible for 
it? I? Quick! Something else to think of! That 
great woman! Yes, great, great! andlso— so— ! Quick! 
bomething else to think of! This -this- -1 

{The library doors open suddenly, and Metaphos 
rushes out. ) 

Metaphos.- Lord! O Lord! (He falls on his knees.) 

Jaeggeb.— Lady! O Lady! Why not? Nature! 

Mother! Thou art nearest to me! On thy bosom 

even I— {His head suddenly drops on his breast, and 

he expires. ) 

( Cli'max. ) 



10 
CLOSING SCENE. 

{The bodies of Mr. and Mrs. Erlebud are seen on the 
bed, side by side. The physician holds the boy in his 
arms. His throat is bandaged, and he is faintly moat,. 
%ng. The landlord holds the child in his arms. Hodin- 
ger ism the library, in an attitude of profound despair. 
Miss ^rUbud is rushing, violently weeping, into the par- 
lor. S7ie stands for a fete moments uttering heartrendinq 
T^*" /^^Ser is sitting in the posture 'he expired in. 
Metaphos is kneeling and muttering intensely prnuers ) 

MissEELEBUD.-Oh! oh! oh! Oh, for voices to cry 
aloud and spare not the sin of the tyranny of creed' 



There they lay— the victims, the sacrificed to thut 
Moloch! 

Metaphos — [Intensely hud.) O Lord! O Lord' from 
the depths I call to thee! 

Miss Eelebud.— Oh, for voices to cry aloud and 
spare not the arrogance of men that would force All- 
niighty Mercy into the channels of sectarian thought' 
Metaphos.— (/nfeH«<% hud. ) O Lord! O Lord! have 
mercy on us! It's we that are blinded, and not Thou 
that art wrong! Lord! O Lord! 

MissEelebud.— Oh, for voices strong enough to 
cry aloud, and spare not the sin of that self-styled 
liberalism that walks into human temples with the 
spurs of the ruffian dangling from its feet! There 
they lay, the victims to that Moloch! My poor, pooi 
brother! And poor, noor Susie! Oh. oh! {She wemn 
intensely for a few momenU, and then addresses Jaeqqer 
whose profile of face w ttirned towards where she is 
standing near him. She does not realize that he is dead ) 
And— and— you, sir! Since my voice is not strong 
enough to cry out against the others, much less can I 
cry out against yours. Ah! vou, too. at last look sad 
do not hold up your head as you generally do Do 
you begin to realize the blasphemy of confounding 
sophistry with truth-telliug ? Do you begin to real- 
ize that there are spheres in which there is an impas- 
sable chasm between what is in itself good and in it- 
self bad? Oh, friend! Oh. brother! with these dead 
before me -oh, oh! I do not charge you with aught. 
1 pray to you, I beseech vou! I hold myself to life 
by beseeching the living. Oh, friend! Oh, brother' 
listen kmdly to me. Now I know vour past No 
father, no mother, no brother, no sister have vou 
known! An orphan, reared by strangers, you grew 
up in your conceits, indulging all your whims, an-f 
becoming sa-urated with that cold-hearted cynicism 
that cliaracterizes yonr school- cold art, soulless art, 
the mere harmony oi form, th<- cold agreement of 
color, the brilliant pride of culture! And so you 

lived- an idle man— a non-laburiug {S?ie suddenly 

stops, and looks him full in the face. She then shakes 
him.) Mr. Jaegger! Mr. Jaegger ! Doctor! {The 
physician enters. Metaphos rises and takes the boy 
from him. Thr physician examines Jaegqer. Hodinqer 
enters.) " 

Physician.— Dead. Sudden stoppage of the heart 
Miss Eblebud.— (;S'/i?'ee/<;s.) Oh! 
Metaphos.— O Lord! 

{Grand Climax.) 




^ The author begs to apologize to the reader for corrections made with the pen here and there in 
this first edition of "About Hell ! " Errors have, in spite of much care, been overlooked before printing 
It, and the author thinks it more advisable to make these corrections with tbe pen than by a printed 
errata-list. ^ 

Copies may be obtained at 25 cents each from any newsdealer, or by addressing 

M. KEAUSKOPF, Brooklyn, N. Y, 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



016 117 891 3 



